Skyline needs to do more to protect transgender students

By Graham Breitbarth Digital Editor

Skyline needs to support transgender community members with better resources.

With all the recent political warfare surrounding transgender people, it’s time for schools like Skyline to rally behind them.

Our leaders have been on a crusade recently, attempting to pass dozens of anti-trans bills. The bills vary in danger for the transgender community. One example is a bill introduced in California, AB 1314, stating that “…a parent or guardian has the right to be notified in writing within 3 days from the date any teacher, counselor, or employee of the school becomes aware that a pupil is identifying at school as a gender that does not align with the child’s sex on their birth certificate, other official records…”

By Nishad Karulkar Opinions Editor

Skyline College’s Transfer Center delivers on its promise of helping students reach their academic and career goals.

In the last few months, many of Skyline’s students have been patiently waiting for college admissions decisions.

The job of being a community college is to act as a launching pad for students pursuing higher education. One of the most important cogs in the process of assisting students in reaching a 4-year college is the efficacy of a community college’s counseling and transfer center departments.

Fortunately for Skyline students, our transfer department is highly organized and efficient, delivering top notch services to the students that need them here in our community.

Transfer coordinators like Ernesto Hernandez or Alexandra Kaplan along with the most experienced transfer counselor at Skyline, Jacqueline Escobar, are passionate about helping students accomplish their goals by providing comprehensive reviews of your academic coursework. They are incredibly knowledgeable of the varying transfer pathways that differ depending on your major and career aspirations.

No matter what your prior academic circumstances are, counselors, students, and administrators part of the Transfer Center demonstrate a strong commitment to helping you navigate Skyline to get you where you need to go.

But even if you work full time and have a busy life outside of school, the Transfer Center’s online resources are also very accessible and easy to use. Their website is streamlined in a way that allows students to act as their own counselors to find the program that best suits their needs.

On the Transfer Center website, there are resources to show you different paths to get to the University of your choice. Whether your dream school is UC San Diego or Sonoma State University, you select the CSU, UC, or private university links on their website that will exhibit instructions on what your next steps will be.

I had a somewhat unique experience in my academic journey. I started at a private university, but then elected to drop out for personal reasons. I arrived at Skyline with goals of transferring to a UC; however, since I would have credits from both a private university and community college, I was forced to do some credit gymnastics in order to meet the 60 credit minimum of the UCs. Thanks to the Transfer Center, I was able to get into the UC of my choice and transfer on time.

Skyline’s Transfer Center and the hardworking counselors who work there are evidently delivering on their promise to provide “the tools you will need to streamline and make the most of your Skyline College experience.”

While AB 1314 doesn’t directly go after college students, it brings a terrifying reality right to our front door–that soon nowhere could be safe. Anti-trans legislation is happening across the country. There needs to be some sort of pushback, a place where transgender people can feel like they can be who they are. Why not have one at Skyline?

It’s not fair to say that Sky- line hasn’t done anything. On the school’s website is a resource section for LGBTQ+ people, including several links to outside resources that support transgender people. While that is a step in the right direction, Skyline could still do more than point to outside help. Offering hands-on support is one of the best ways to make them feel like a true part of our community. Skyline could offer a lot of different types of support to transgender people, such as offering specialized counseling for them. Transgender people don’t always transition in their youth, the process can take years and sometimes even start in their later life. A counselor to help them through that time in college could be the difference between life and death for them. They could even help by offering asylum housing to trans kids coming from families that don’t support them.

Transgender people face an uncertain future. When countries like America fail to protect their citizens, places and schools like Skyline should become a pillar of safety for those whose identities are under attack.