PRIDE Club offers a safe space for queer students along with allies Kaitlyn Michaelson, secretary and social media manager, and Abby Wiesler, a member, recently shared.
“We all have the community and we all come together,” Michaelson said.
PRIDE Club was formed at Wayne State College to ensure a safe space exists for individuals of the LGBTQ+ community. The club serves to simultaneously support the community while educating the campus and town about queer struggles and various sexualities.
The club hosts optional meetings every Monday at 6 p.m. in the MCC room, next door to the SAB office in the lower gag where attendance varies from anywhere between 20 to 30 people. Meetings include event planning, games, organized conversations and voluntary personal life updates much like a support group.
“It’s really nice to have a local place I can go to find other people like myself,” Wiesler said.
Kamryn Reynolds and Adrian Huff are the president and vice president of PRIDE club. Their roles include leading meetings and planning the major annual events with the help of the club members.
“Our leaders are very kind and understanding people,” Wiesler said.
The club’s biggest events are Coming Out Day in the fall and the Drag Show in the spring. “It’s a day for people who are part of the community to come out, if they feel safe, and we celebrate everybody who feels that they are safe enough to come out and we will be that support system for them,” Michaelson said.
Coming Out Day takes place in October where members provide a space for the public to come and ask any questions they may have while enjoying a free cookie. The day aims to spread awareness around the LGBTQ+ community and PRIDE Club.
The Drag Show takes place in April. “That’s where the majority of our efforts go because it’s really important to have, especially in the middle of nowhere in Nebraska,” Michaelson said. The club invites drag queens from the area, like Omaha and Norfolk, to perform and gather the campus in support of the queer community.
“It’s free so anybody who wants to come can come,” Michaelson said.
The size of the show demands more help from other WSC clubs such as GAMMA, Photography Club, Drama Club, Survivors Not Victims and Kappa Kappa Psi, who also use the event to shed light on their clubs and organizations. Announcements promoting these events are shared via Instagram at WSC PRIDE Club as well as through Canvas and fliers around campus.
The club values diversity within itself and tries to include people of all sexualities, races and walks of life. Although they aim to spread awareness, not much attention from outside the community is received. Queer individuals and their ally friends who are already members are usually the ones to show support at the events, but the club wants to expand.
“They don’t hate it, but they just don’t care to learn about it,” Wiesler said. She shared that students can find people just like them in PRIDE Club and feel better knowing they have support. “Without that, I don’t think we would have as good a community as we do here at Wayne State,” Wielser said.
