Students, staff share personal experiences

West students and staff who are a part of the LGBTQ community carry unique stories and experiences about the process of understanding and discovering identity in different stages of life and in different environments.

Due to its inclusive atmosphere, junior Cody Ulrich finds school to be a safe haven as a transgender student.

“Being able to come here and being in an environment where I’m accepted for the most part is very nice, especially mentally. Being called by my name by all of my teachers and having the right pronouns used by everyone that I know in the place where I spend most of my time has been very nice,” he said. “In my personal experience, I’ve definitely had a much better experience than some people, which I’m very thankful for.”

Being an LGBTQ teacher, band director Brian Wilson has not been treated differently than any other staff member by students.

“I’ve never had anyone in this building openly call me a derogatory term, and I feel like I’ve been treated with the same respect as other teachers,” he said. “I appreciate that I can be in my classroom or talking to other colleagues and talk about my life, talk about my husband. I never notice any snickering or laughing or anything, and I think that’s really fantastic. I hope that other teachers who are in that same group are being treated the same way.”

Special education teacher Kaylee Bork is also a part of the LGBTQ community and provides a unique perspective that students can look up to. 

“I identify with queer, and the definition of queer is anything varying from the norm,” she said. “I believe my partner could be female, could be male, could be agender, could be non-gender. Hearts, not parts. I don’t limit my label, and I see potential in anyone being my partner someday.”

Ulrich has learned not to stress out about putting a label on himself, especially because the process of figuring out identity can be long and confusing enough already.

“Sure, I put a label on it for simplicity’s sake- trans masc, trans man, whatever you want to call it, that’s how I identify and it’s taken me a while to accept that,” he said. “It’s just such a long process that you need to allow yourself to experience and be kind to yourself while it’s happening. If you’re not kind to yourself and constantly beating yourself up over how you identify, that’s not going to do you any good.”

Being bisexual has caused junior Abi Potratz to struggle with finding a community where she feels one hundred percent accepted.

“Being bi, you get excluded within the LGBT community as well as without,” she said. “I’m not straight, so I’m not always accepted among straight people, but oftentimes gay people will say ‘oh, you just can’t make up your mind, you’re not gay enough’, things like that. I’m kind of stuck in this in between, like where do I really belong?”

Education has been an important part of Bork’s journey to gain a better understanding of the people around her as well as herself.

“I was part of the LGBTQ+ resource center at UWO, which really opened my eyes and made me want to learn more, because I had no idea there were all these identities out there,” she said. “I wanted to learn more about people who were different than myself, and I wanted to know more about who I was as a person instead of just checking the box ‘heterosexual’ and not completely identifying with that. Just not being confined by those labels, but also having a label that can empower me.”

Potratz has dealt with comments made by straight people that are more harmful than they might appear on the surface.

“When I’ve come out to some of my friends that are female, they’ll make comments like, ‘that’s fine, as long as you don’t have a crush on me’ or they’ll make it out to be that I’m making them uncomfortable with my bisexuality,” she said. “I’m not going to force myself onto you, I just wanted you to know this is who I am. Or I’ll get the side-eye, or people will start distancing themselves.”

For reasons personal to her, Bork has chosen to go by a different honorific than most other female teachers.

“Honestly, I am recently divorced and strongly dislike that a female's marital status is tied to their prefix, but for males it is not. I did not want to become a ‘Ms.,’ and wanted to be more inclusive, so I chose ‘Mx.’ (pronounced Mix), but I honestly just prefer ‘Bork’,” she said. “However, within our ‘culture’ it is a societal expectation that students use teachers' prefixes as a sign of respect, so to conform to society, I chose Mx. I still identity as female, and have the same pronouns of ‘she/her/hers,’ but a nonbinary prefix.”

Having gone through the process of coming to understand her bisexuality, senior Jasmine Travis has some advice for students figuring out who they are and coming to terms with their identity.

“Find that one person you’re comfortable with first and start there. Take your time if you need to,” she said. “I wouldn’t pressure someone to come out; they come out when they’re ready. Don’t be afraid to come out though; be confident. Because it is who you are. That’s not something you can just take off; it’s not something you can just get rid of. It’s there, and you should be proud of it.”

by Abby Furcy

Oshkosh West Index Volume 118 Issue IV

January 31st, 2022