Job hunting online recently from his home in Pennsylvania, John Kichi received something of a shock when he came upon an opening at Colorado College. An optional question seeking gender information listed five choices: Not disclosed. Male. Female. Transgender.
And the fifth — Queer.
“I couldn’t believe it. I thought I was going to have a stroke,” Kichi said. “It’s totally from the Dark Ages.”
Kichi said he thought someone may have been punking him or that the school’s website had been hacked. But it turned out the school willfully includes the designation on all of its applications.
And despite being in a community filled with many conservative religious entities, Colorado College officials believe they have nothing to apologize for.
“I’m proud to work for a school that doesn’t just talk the talk, we walk it, too,” said Barbara Wilson, the college’s director of human resources. “In the midst of the volume of conservatism in this city, we’re almost a safe haven.”
As far as Colorado College is concerned, using the term on applications is “intended to represent the college’s commitment to and acknowledgment of diversity related to gender,” according to a statement from the school. “Colorado College is very much committed to diversity, and is very open about sexual orientation.”
The school’s office of Minority and International Students uses the following definition of queer in its training: “An umbrella term describing people who have a non-normative gender identity, sexual orientation, or sexual anatomy—includes lesbians, gay men, bisexual people, asexual people, transgender people, intersex people, etc.”
While the school acknowledges that the term is used as a slur by some, it adds: “Others have reclaimed it and are comfortable using it to describe themselves.”
About a year ago as part of its long-term strategic plan, Colorado College surveyed its faculty and staff regarding issues such as race, employment status and gender. In the process, the company doing the survey told school officials that the climate at more universities has opened up to the point where the term queer has grown in acceptance.
So in addition to asking it on a voluntary basis of faculty, staff and students, the school added it to its job application form. Wilson said the question is akin to determining if someone prefers to be known as black or African-American, and is in keeping with the philosophy on a campus that is “intentionally committed to diversity and inclusion.”
When she arrived 13 years ago, Wilson said the school already offered same-sex insurance to its employees, and about three years ago, a full-time exempt position was created that focused on the gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, queer, intersex and asexual student population. One of the umbrella student organizations on campus is called the Queer Community Coalition.
Even so, Kichi, a gay man who said he’s lost jobs and homes because of his sexual orientation, said the term is insulting.
“If them including it on applications isn’t against the law, it should be,” he said.
Kichi, who was angry enough to send a complaint to Colorado Attorney General John Suthers, is 66 years old.
Charles Irwin, the executive director of Colorado Springs Pride, a gay rights organization in the city, said that Kichi’s age may be the reason behind the differing viewpoints.
“Queer is a challenging word, a word that’s in transition,” he said. “But today’s youth embraces it very well.”
