Cupcakes with ROYGBIV frosting and all sorts of colors of tie-dye were the perfect ingredients to make the participants’ of Ithaca College’s annual Pride Fest cover their smiles and hands with all the colors of the rainbow. 

This year’s Pride Fest was a bit of a twist from the original Pride Night the college hosts annually in the fall. This year, held on Aug. 19 outside on the Campus Center Quad in full sunshine, with dance music blasting, the event was planned to accommodate more students. 

Pride Fest was planned by the NSTP staff and was overseen by Caryanne Keenan, director of NSTP and Eleanor Kay ’23, one of the college’s New Student and Transition Program’s staff of orientation assistants. 

June Sheridan, an NSTP administrative assistant, said the fest was one of the largest events at orientation, no matter the year, no matter the activities. Sheridan said one of their hopes for Pride Fest was to witness connections being made throughout the three-hour event. 

Sheridan said since most parents, families and supporters left campus two days prior to the sunny Saturday afternoon, that it is always important for students to explore their new-found independence and to have a chance to be their truest, most authentic selves. 

“I’m most excited for first-year students to feel like they are in a safe space where they can be themselves and not hide certain parts of their identity because they’re uncomfortable or afraid, but that they feel like they can be out and they can be proud if they want to,” Sheridan said ahead of the event.

Fall orientation is a big deal for colleges; it’s a time for new students to get to know their peers, the resources on their new campus and it becomes a chance for new students to have some fun before college life begins in full swing once classes start. Pride Fest is an example of rethinking the events that have been a part of the college’s fall orientation for many years.

Leading up to Pride Fest, Junior Alecia Solorzano, an orientation leader for the fall orientation students, said that the planning of the event by the NSTP staff along with the inclusivity of the campus felt authentic. She said since the college has events and informational opportunities for and about the LGBTQ+ community, that the intent of Pride Fest is an example of the college’s truly inclusive message. 

“If you go [to Pride Fest], I think there are many opportunities and [there will be] certain things at the event that will make people feel welcomed,” Solorzano said. “I don’t think that it’s performance activism.”

First-year Elizabeth Christmas, said she wondered if the intent for Pride Fest was the same as big companies that show off their “support” for the LGBTQ+ community just for the month of June. However, she also commented that the feel of the event was much more genuine than the big corporate show-off of inclusivity. 

“It feels a little bit corporate-y, but at the same time, it does feel like the [LGBTQ+] community put it together,” Christmas said at the event. “It feels like it’s here to bring people together and just to have fun.”

Junior Maddie Etman, an orientation mentor, said that while on the surface, many of the aspects of a pride event like Pride Fest can seem showy, performative and corporate-based, this one was meant to make new students who identify with the LGBTQ+ community feel seen. 

“No one’s forcing us to do it,” Etman said. “We’re doing it because we want to, and a lot of the people running it are clear and the people who thought of it are clear that at its core, [Pride Fest is] really just a way to make people feel accepted and make people excited about the community we have here.” 

Four affinity groups were identified among the new students coming to campus, which NSTP staff members were assigned to and worked on planning events for. The groups included international students, first-generation students, BIPOC students and students who identify within the LGBTQ+ community. The college ranked 5 out of 5 stars for inclusivity according to the Campus Pride Index. 

Sheridan said because there is so much intersectionality within the college, mixer events and other activities were planned to be as inclusive as possible. NSTP staff members said each affinity group could have their designated event times throughout orientation week. 

“It’s a celebration of our LGBT+ students on campus, a celebration of our staff members on campus,” Sheridan said. “It’s a celebration of how inclusive Ithaca is and how welcoming it is to the community. I think that’s the main thing, it’s just a celebration of connection and that’s hopefully what we’re going to be able to pull off.”

The original idea for Pride Night was deemed, “Pride Party”, which was hosted by residential halls Landon, Bogart and Clarke in 2019. However, the first Pride Night at the college — though not as an orientation event — was held in 2017 as a men’s and women’s basketball tournament doubleheader. In 2018, for the second-annual basketball-based Pride Night, the college challenged Clarkson University, where players wore rainbow sweatbands and fan-favorite DJ Washburn was featured.

Clearly, there has been a major evolution of the college’s pride events, from Pride basketball to Pride Fest. Although there were no rainbow sweatbands, the NSTP ordered enough rainbow koozies for the entire incoming class and had rainbow tattoos, stickers, pins and hats for students to make gift bags for themselves.

Out on the quad, amid the music, students joined orientation leaders and members of the NSTP staff under a rainbow parachute while other students sat and picnicked in the sunshine.  

With so many ways to celebrate pride, some new students, like Christmas, said that such events have given her a sense of community once she arrived on campus. 

“It’s nice to have a group already and to be able to do your own thing,” Christmas said. “And to just know that we’re all being supported by each other. It really helps to set the community.”

Although pride events have been a staple at the college since 2017, COVID-19 caused a major gap for students to experience these events. Senior Reilly Shingler was a proponent of getting pride events back on track in 2021. She said that when she helped with bringing them back, her mindset was never the same as corporations who may act performatively during pride month, but was driven more to help re-open the community on campus. 

“I didn’t do it in a way to be performative,” Shingler said. “I did it … to let people feel comfortable in that kind of environment. I also think that [pride events are] definitely very different, especially when there are people who identify as queer that are planning and executing them.” 

To truly show LGBTQ+ students that the college is genuinely mindful of them, Luca Maurer, the college’s previous director of the Center for LGBT Education, Outreach and Services, was present at the event while the newly named director Crissi Dalfonzo was announced on Aug. 22. Maurer was there to showcase the on-campus resources available to LGBTQ+ students, including the center’s professionals, library with handouts regarding LGBTQ+ issues and relaxation room with a kitchen stocked with coffee and tea. 

“While we have this really awesome day full of pride and celebration, [we are addressing] what comes after that,” Sheridan said. “How can we connect students to what’s going on during the semester, like what clubs or what people they can connect to, to continue that support after Pride Fest … throughout the upcoming semester … and through the rest of college?”

Editor’s note: Eleanor Kay is a former managing editor of The Ithacan