By: Will Harper, staff writer

Over the past few years, Wofford has made strides toward becoming more diverse and inclusive. One of the more noticeable actions that that have been added to Wofford’s portfolio of inclusiveness is the LGBTQIA Ally Training events being held.

Kyle Keith, study abroad coordinator and member of the Presidential Committee on Diversity and Inclusion, and Demario Watts, head of Diversity and Inclusion, sat down to discuss the ally training as well as their overall perception of the college’s acceptance of the LGBTQIA community at Wofford.

“We’re helping students who primarily do not identify and are not in the community to learn tools, strategies and different attitudes that they can adopt to be a better supporter and resource for their friends, family and peers that identify in the LGBTQIA community,” says Keith. “In terms of what a training looks like, we go over different learning outcomes about what we want to get out of training… What do each of these letters involve? Why are they important? Why is it an ever-growing community?”

Both Watts and Keith discussed acceptance as a whole at Wofford.

“Some things that I think that as a community we can do to continue to move forward, especially on how we include students of difference, or students of color, or students who identify as LGBTQIA, most of it is starting with yourself,” says Watts. “Sometimes there are unconscious biases that feed into some of the decisions. That’s the first step, making ourselves more aware of what we have going on, and trying to figure out ways in order to fix that.”

As the school moves forward, Wofford is increasing work to be more accepting of all people, no matter their race, religion, political beliefs or sexual orientation. There are multiple Ally Trainings coming up over the semester, to be scheduled at a later date. If you’re interested in attending, check the Daily Announcements and the Wofford campus calendar to see when the next training is.