'Gay Social Workers' advocate education on sexuality issues

As part of continuing events this week celebrating Coming Out Days, a group of lesbian, gay and bisexual Social Work graduate students held a discussion yesterday focusing on the profession's handling of homosexual issues. During the discussion -- which the Lesbian, Gay and Bisexual Social Workers at Penn held in the Caster Building's student lounge -- several students underscored the importance of preparing social workers to deal with the gay and bisexual communities. "People will undoubtedly be working with gay and lesbian clients," noted Social Work graduate student and LGBSWAP President Gina Rosich. "[And] as social workers we're educators." Social Work Professor Andrew Anderson, who coordinates the school's Continuing Education and Part Time Programs, said after the discussion that he admires efforts to expose students to sexual orientation issues. The openly gay professor added that "within the last five or six years, the school has been making a conscious effort to be more inclusive. "The school is making strides," he added. Nevertheless, students agreed that more should be done to educate on issues of sexual awareness. Brian McDermott, a straight Social Work graduate student who said he attended the LGBSWAP meeting because of his interest in the issue, advocated the creation of a course to educate students about sexual orientation. Chris Nguyen, a gay Social Work and Medical student, added that "sexual orientation education] can't be grouped into generic counselling." Saying he hopes the students' concerns will be met, Anderson agreed that such a course would benefit Social Work students. He said the aim of the course would be to increase student knowledge about dealing with gays, lesbians and bisexuals. "It's important for students who are not gay to ask the kind of questions they want to ask in a safe environment," he said. Social Work students currently take a "practice" class giving them hands-on experience in the field. Although some required readings for the class deal with gay and lesbian issues, several students said that more was necessary. Anderson added that the University's gay community has received increased support in recent years from the administration. LGBSWAP, for example, was included in the School of Social Work's annual bulletin as early as last year, when the group was just getting off the ground. And yesterday Social Work officials voted to give $1,000 in funding to the organization. Social Work student Juan Perez emphasized the comfortable environment he found when he came to the University, especially in the School of Social Work. "Now that we know who we are we kind of stick together," he said. "It's like a family." Also yesterday, about 10 gay, lesbian and bisexual undergraduates "came out" of the button on College Green to symbolize their own coming out. And last night students shared coming out stories at the Lesbian, Gay and Bisexual Alliance office in Houston Hall. Upcoming activities for Coming Out Days include the showing of "It's Elementary" sponsored by OutEd tonight at 7 p.m. Lambda Grads will also host a Coming Out Days Happy Hour at 5:30 p.m. tomorrow in the Penniman Library in Bennett Hall.