Pride 2023 honors LGBTQ+ community

BY Lorraine Liu The Dartmouth Senior Staff

This article was originally published on April 25, 2023.

From April 7 to May 25, campus organizations including the Office of Pluralism and Leadership have planned a series of events to commemorate Pride 2023, an annual celebration of the LGBTQ+ community on campus.

Pride 2023 is organized by the student-run Pride committee, which works with OPAL to plan a number of events. Organizers have scheduled the College’s first ever Pride parade for May 7 and the relaunch of the Rainbow Room — a queer study space in Robinson Hall — for April 27. On May 11, the Pride committee will host an LGBTQ+ critical dialogue panel, and on May 5, the House of Lewan will hold its annual Transform drag show, according to OPAL Program Coordinator of Community and Leadership Development Angélique Bouthot.

Unlike past years, Pride 2023 lacks a theme, which allows for Pride to be “up for interpretation by the community,” said Pride 2023 planning committee co-chair Rosario Rosales ’25.

“We just kind of want to experiment with [a themeless Pride] especially because it allows for an openness of events,” she said. “We don’t feel so restricted.”

According to Rosales, the seven member Pride 2023 committee started planning near the end of winter term, when they “consolidated a list of events.” The bulk of the Pride 2023 planning work was student-led and involved budgeting, recruiting volunteers and wrangling student organizations or faculty members to participate at the events.

Administrators from OPAL provided organizers with institutional support, funding and advice when necessary, Rosales said.

When determining the events they wanted for Pride, Rosales said they wanted “at least one huge, go all out event.”

“In this case, [that event] is the Pride parade,” Rosales said. “We have to go all out and we didn’t want two of those kinds of events. It was also just mainly what felt right.”

According to Rosales, the Pride parade on May 7 involves marching from Triangle House to Massachusetts Row, with student speakers and music.

Anna Timchenko ’26, a Pride 2023 volunteer, said they are especially looking forward to the Pride parade.

“I’ve never been to a full-on Pride parade, so it’d be lovely for me to go,” Timchenko said.

In an email statement, Bouthot wrote about the “incredible value” of Pride programming on campus, which provides students of marginalized identities with the knowledge that “they are celebrated.”

“Many places in the US and the world are not safe, physically, emotionally — or in terms of legal

On April 23, the Elections Planning and Advisory Committee and The Dartmouth co-hosted a forum for Student Government presidential candidate Jess Chiriboga ’24 and Student Government vice presidential candidate Kiara Ortiz ’24 to answer students’ questions and discuss their platform. Chiriboga and Ortiz ran unopposed on the ballot and won their election, garnering 1,173 and 1,056 votes, respectively.

Students voted electronically from April 24 at 5 p.m. to April 26 at 5 p.m. Elections for representatives for Student Government, Class Council, the Committee on Standards and the Organizational Adjudication Committee representatives ran concurrently.

In the forum, Ortiz said she hopes to guide the new Dartmouth administration, which will take office under incoming College President Sian Leah Beilock on July 1, toward policies that best serve student needs.

“Our job is to advocate for what the students want,” Ortiz said. “We’re pushing forward, and I think the administration is kind of like, ‘Yeah, these students are not going to settle for any less than this, so, let’s figure out a way to solve this issue.’”

In the 2023-2024 academic year, the duo plans to focus on sustainability, equity and town relations. Chiriboga and Ortiz are also working to implement free and functional laundry, indoor and outdoor wellness spaces, shuttles to A-lot and institutionalized transportation vouchers, according to a campus-wide email they sent on Monday.

However, Chiriboga and Ortiz both stressed in the forum that their top priority in working with the new administration is to advocate for student mental health and expand access to resources. This past year, Student Government –– led by president David Millman ’23 with Chriboga as vice president –– successfully spearheaded 24/7 UWill therapy for students.

Chiriboga and Ortiz in the forum said they will prioritize expanding long-term, in-person therapy options at the counseling center and creating additional funds for students to receive counseling services in the Upper Valley.

They also hope to implement termly wellness days, though Chiriboga said in the forum they are unclear on how a “Day of Caring” would work in practice. Chiriboga added that she hopes to ensure that “in every sector of student life,” the College takes student mental health and wellness into its approach.

Ortiz currently serves as the Student Government chief of staff and West House senator. According to Chiriboga, through their extensive involvement in Student Government since freshman year, she and Ortiz have experience building relationships with senior administrators, the Board of Trustees and staff members across campus, with a proven track record of establishing new initiatives.

“That [track record] is going to put us in a great position to be the best advocates for students next year because they’re going to need somebody in a student role who’s had prior experience,” Chiriboga said in the forum.

In the past year, Chiriboga and Ortiz’s work in Student Government also led to access to the Headspace app for all undergraduates, the reopening of late night at the Class of 1953 Commons and the installation of Wifi on the Green, among other programs.

Chiriboga said her identity motivates her to serve on Student Government and foster change.

“I have no political aspirations,” Chiriboga said in the forum. “I do Student Government work because it’s always been important to me as a woman of color, as somebody who really cares deeply about mental health and LGBTQ+ people to be active in my community and to try to make the areas around me a better place.”

Anthony Fosu ’24, who was elected as Senior Class vice president alongside Senior Class president Kami Arabian ’24, wrote that he hopes to make changes to benefit the community, uniting the Class of 2024 and ensuring his classmates feel a sense of belonging.

“For me, running with Kami was motivated by wanting to serve as much of our class as possible, and to do it in a way that could help bring different parts of campus together,” Fosu wrote. “I am extremely excited to get to work serving our classmates.”

Chiriboga and Ortiz said that all of their Student Government meetings are open to the public, adding that if a student attends three meetings, they can become a representative and lead their own projects.

Chiriboga is a former member of The Dartmouth staff.