Bloomington to host 15th annual GLBT college conference in 2009

Come February 2009, IU will become home for one weekend to more than 1,500 attendees of the 15th annual Midwest Bisexual, Lesbian, Gay, Transgender Ally College Conference. \n“I think (the conference) will help open the community up and hopefully provide a greater sense of unity both between gays, lesbians and allies and everybody else, because it will need so much manpower,” sophomore Kadie Dunkel said.\nDoug Bauder, coordinator of the GLBT Student Support Services office, said he and six IU students, including Dunkel and Rob Decleene, director of tourism for the Conventions and Visitors Bureau, made a formal bid at last year’s conference at the University of Minnesota at Twin Cities. Coordinators accepted the bid, allowing the group to begin preparation for the 2009 conference “Living Out Loud: Examining our Past to Enhance our Future.”\n“(Last year’s conference) was an amazing experience that offered a very large sense of community while still having a lot of educational opportunities,” Dunkel said.\nThough the conference has not yet been fully planned, Bauder said there will be keynote speakers and individual workshops in various topics ranging from personal issues to political to religion. \nGuest speakers have not yet been chosen, but Bauder said planners are expecting to know who those people will be sometime after this year’s conference at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.\nBauder also said that, though there tend to be mostly gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgender attendees, a fair number of straight people attended last year’s convention. He said many friends of gays choose to attend the event in support.\n“Anybody who comes would enjoy it. It’s open to anybody, but it’s specifically geared to people who identify themselves as gay or lesbian, bi or transgender,” he said. “It certainly could be an educational experience for anyone.”\nThe Midwest conference is among the best-attended programs among the GLBT conferences. Bauder said that could be because the Midwest offers more GLBT resources than coastal areas. Bauder also said the size of the conference makes it appealing to performers and entertainers who planners might try to bring to the 2009 conference.\n“There were so many people (at last year’s conference). I was surprised by the number because it is a Midwest thing,” Dunkel said. “I don’t necessarily think of that many college-age Midwestern youth being active enough to go to a three-day conference, and there were people from all over the Midwest there.”\nDeCleene said the city is expecting to make about $400,000 from the conference, and Bloomington’s large gay and lesbian community has led to more of an effort from the Bloomington Convention and Visitors Bureau to appeal to gay and lesbian travelers. Bauder said that Bloomington has a lot to offer in terms of facilities and climate, making it an ideal place to host the conference.\n“We have a large, open and accepting campus,” Dunkel said. “The Kinsey Institute is a perk, and I think Bloomington has the resources that would be needed.”\nEven though the event is still in the early planning stages, DeCleene said the general reaction from the community has been positive.\n“(The community’s) reaction has been fantastic,” DeCleene said. “Our office has received no negative phone calls. I think it will be a very welcoming community and campus for these people for the weekend.”