Spectrum and the University’s Office of Multicultural Affairs partnered to create a new program for the campus community to establish connections within the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer community.
The program, called First Contact, trains members to be mentors for students who are coming out as LGBTQ or questioning their sexual orientations or gender identities.
Adrian Serio, Spectrum vice president and biological and agricultural engineering senior, based the idea for First Contact on his own coming out experience.
Serio said at one time he felt had no one to talk to about what he was experiencing with coming out. That’s when he found a personal connection with one of his professors.
“There was a professor in one of my classes talking about her partner,” Serio said. “I decided to talk with her and pretty much dumped out everything