Written by Tiana Chrans|
GSA stands for Gay Straight Alliance, an all inclusive acceptance club based around celebrating diversity. GSA is a safe place for students to go and feel accepted. The club was built with the hopes of making Morgan students feel more comfortable in the community and to let students know that they are not alone. Everyone is welcome; the club is a safe place to open up without judgement or discrimination. Members know that the other kids can be trusted. GSA provides a place to make new friends. All of the members in this club came from different groups or “cliques” and united through this club and became a tight-knit group of kids.
With Junior Juliana Ragonese as the club’s fearless leader, the club has grown very much in the past four years and is trying to open up to doing more school wide events. The group wants to open up to increase diversity. Starting with Ally Week that was held in 2014, the club has been growing and taking the initiative. Just this year the member count increased by almost 15 new students.
The club is working on doing some sort of “project” each semester to build momentum. Last semester’s project was a revised revival of Ally week. This semester GSA is planning a Tie Dye Event May 10th, after school in World Language teacher Susan Peterson’s room. It will be free to attend, and anyone can go to do some rad tie dye, while supplies last, “The goal for the event is for our club members to hang out and bond outside of a traditional meeting; however, we want to have it open to the students outside of the club as well.” said Club Leader Juliana Ragonese.
The club is also organizing an outside of school trip to the New York City Pride Parade to unite and bond as a group. Pride NYC is an exciting event held on Sunday, June 26th. This festive parade was formed to commemorate the Stonewall riots that launched the gay rights movement. It is important because it celebrates pride for being yourself and not hiding in the face of hatred but continuing to fight for rights despite the horrors this community has faced while celebrating how far the movement has come.
Meetings are held once a month on Fridays in Mrs. Peterson’s room. If interested, contact Juliana directly at her email, [email protected], or reach out to any club members.