Numerous colleges nationwide have shuttered their LGBTQ+ centers under political pressure to end all diversity, equity, and inclusivity (DEI) programs, but not at Utah’s Salt Lake Community College (SLCC).

Peter Moosman was hired at SLCC in 2019 to help open up its Gender and Sexuality Student Resource Center, an office supportive of LGBTQ+ and female students. The center is open to all students: It has a drop-in lounge, offers connections to community groups and resources, and hosts events, programs, and trainings for affinity months like LGBTQ+ History Month or Women’s Heritage Month.

Moosman, who currently serves as the center’s manager and as SLCC’s assistant director of cultural programming, oversaw the center exclusively until October 2024, when the Utah state legislature passed H.B. 261, a law that prohibits state-funded colleges from “discriminatory practices that favored certain identity populations over others.” Then, last February, the U.S. Department of Education sent out a letter pledging to end federal funding to any schools with DEI programs.

“By having programming or spaces or things that were exclusive to a certain identity group, it was considered discriminatory,” said Moosman, who spoke to LGBTQ Nation as a private individual and not as a representative of the college. Nevertheless, SLCC has shifted the center’s role, he explained, and its marketing now makes it explicitly clear that the center serves all students, just through a lens of gender and sexuality.

“Our center never excluded anyone from any programming, any services, any resources,” Moosman said. “We were not checking IDs at the door. We had a lot of straight students coming in and getting resources. We had a lot of cisgender students coming in and getting resources. So we were never engaged in the discriminatory practices that were outlined in H.B. 261.”

However, the law prohibits any activities that teach that any “individual’s personal identity characteristics, [are] inherently privileged, oppressed … [or] oppressive” or that “socio-political structures are inherently a series of power relationships.” These restrictions could potentially make it difficult for any college professional to discuss the role of political oppression against LGBTQ+ and women, especially when observing any affinity month like LGBTQ+ History Month.

Despite this, the Department of Education noted that schools can hold programs centered around “educational, cultural, or historical observances — such as Black History Month … — that celebrate or recognize historical events and contributions, and promote awareness, so long as they do not engage in racial exclusion or discrimination.”

To comply with these directives, Moosman says the center now highlights contributions from women or LGBTQ+ historical figures rather than the specific oppressions they faced.

“We can talk about how these communities are thriving. We can celebrate achievements. We just can’t say something like, ‘Queer people are oppressed and need to be recognized,’” Moosman said. “A lot of what these bills and these laws and these mandates are forcing us into are semantics games, and it’s challenging, it’s frustrating.”

“A lot of what these bills and these laws and these mandates are forcing us into are semantics games, and it’s challenging, it’s frustrating.”– Peter Moosman, Assistant Director of cultural programming and manager of the Gender and Sexuality Resource Center at Salt Lake Community College

Despite the frustration, Moosman has also seen some opportunities to engage people on gender and sexuality issues in a different and possibly more accessible way. 

The center used to provide LGBTQ+ awareness training that trained different campus departments on things like pronouns and the history and culture of the queer community. Now, the center offers a “Gender and Sexuality 101” presentation that looks at how gender and sexuality have been expressed in nature, history, culture, and biological differences. Moosman said presenters make it three-fourths through the presentation before they even mention any queer terminology.

“I’ve been teaching these courses for a very long time, and when we start the conversation like talking about ‘power’ and ‘privilege,’ which are kind of like these political buzzwords, I see people in the audience kind of like turn off, they shut off, or they get angry and defensive, and it derails our conversation,” Moosman said. “But when I have been able to change the language and use more neutral terms — instead of saying ‘privilege,’ talk about ‘accessibility’ or ‘opportunity’ — they stay engaged longer.”

While he’s not speaking as an SLCC representative, Moosman thinks it’s important to share the ways his school has been navigating these policies, both as a form of educational solidarity and also as a potential roadmap for institutions navigating similar political challenges.

“As I’m watching these LGBT centers shut down, it makes me sad, of course, because these centers are saving lives. These centers are serving students in a way that they’re not getting at home or elsewhere… but even more, I think we see nationally how quickly and how easily people are bending and breaking under this pressure, instead of trying to find new ways and pivot to continue to serve students through creative measures,” he said.

“How do we find creative ways to still engage, to still serve our communities, still show up and exist, especially when we are representing government entities… and being restricted through laws?” Moosman asked rhetorically.

Citing philosopher Cornel West, Moosman said that people need to develop the ability to be “protean,” which Moosman defines as “the ability to be flexible, to change without losing the core of our purpose and our passions.”

“We can continue to do what we need to do, while matching the energy of the situation, of the environment right,” Moosman said. “So institutions that are funded by federal dollars, institutions that are funded by state dollars, that are being forced to bend with these new laws and these new mandates, it’s going to require us, through many creative ways, to be protean.”