At Sunday's Senate meeting, the assembled senators voted unanimously to pass a resolution in support of a proposal for a gender and sexuality center and director. The proposal, put forth by Alex Thomson '15, junior representative to the Board of Trustees, outlined a plan to create a physical space for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer support, education and outreach programming, as well as a full-time directorial position for the center. In total, Thomson's estimates of the cost for this project come to $85,000 to $90,000 annually, to be taken from the department of Students and Enrollment's budget.

The task force that created the proposal also included Margaret Bouchard '14 of the Queer Resource Center, Molly Gimbel '16, representing Triskelion, Michael Pizziferri '15 of the Queer Policy Alliance and Sara Brande '15 from TransBrandeis. Thomson said that they met over the summer to discuss the proposal.

Thomson said that he had also emailed the proposal to Fran Bermanzohn'78, the chairwoman of the students and enrollment committee of the Board of Trustees, and that he would speak on the topic at the Board's next meeting.

Should the plan be approved by University administration as written, it would allocate $30,000 annually for the center, at a space to be determined, and $55,000 to $60,000, which was described as a "competitive salary," for the director of the center. According to the proposal, the director would oversee areas including "counseling services," "a comprehensive LGBTQ-friendly orientation program," "support staff," "trainings, clubs and organizations and policies that take into account the specific needs of [the LGBTQ] community."

In addition to the physical center and the director, Thomson said that "we would see ... the director being there, someone that would assist part time, and then also students that would continue to offer their services, but in a paid capacity, or stipend capacity."

However, he added that the priority of the committee that wrote the proposal is to hire a full-time staff member dedicated to these issues.

"If I were to say the importance of it, it would be a full-time position, and then a center," he said in an interview with the Justice. "Our goal is to get both, but it's more important to have a full-time person." If the full-time position were established without a center, Thomson said he imagines that this person's salary would be slightly lower at around $45,000 to $50,000 per year.

While Thomson specified that the initial proposal was written before Jessica Pedrick, Program Coordinator for Sexuality and Gender Diversity, joined the University, he said that "we envision that, from our interactions with her, she's very great, already a great resource, so we would envision her taking on the full-time role."

According to Thomson, the proposal was inspired by discussion at a queer caucus toward the end of last year held by the Queer Policy Alliance. "That was really one of the first times that all queer students from each of the different queer groups on campus came together," he said. "At the queer caucus ... is when I heard a lot of the sentiments being expressed, that it was such disillusionment and almost starting to become really disliking Brandeis for not offering these services."

Currently, said Thomson, most of the LGBTQ resources on campus are provided by student-run clubs, which cannot provide sufficient services.

"The Queer Resource Center, which provides obviously the most resources to students on campus, does a phenomenal job," he said. "But at the same time, they are students that have other work obligations and schoolwork on top of this. So it's basically asking students to take on the burden of what the University should be providing."

"I've heard from many of the other queer students that they feel like they are burdened with this, that they have an obligation to provide these resources, and it detracts from their own well-being, so they feel like they are taking on all of this responsibility in order to help others, but at the same time their grades are suffering," he said.

While Thomson commended the efforts of Pedrick and Jessamine Beal, her predecessor, he added that a part-time position was also not enough to address the larger issues on campus. "It's almost like triage right now," he said. "The part-time position also barely allows her to just scratch the surface with all the needs that are unmet on campus. So she is able to be a counselor, she is able to facilitate safe-space, allies training programs, but there's not really enough time designated to it to transform the queer culture on campus, which really is the ultimate goal."

Currently Pedrick's position is 20 hours per week and 10 months per year, excluding the summer break. Thomson claims that because of the high demand within this limited time frame, it is often difficult for students to secure an appointment with Pedrick when they might need one urgently.

While the Senate resolution is non-binding, Thomson said in an interview with the Justice that he would officially present the proposal, along with the Senate's statement of support, to Senior Vice President of Students and Enrollment Andrew Flagel and Dean of Students Jamele Adams in a meeting this Friday.