College appoints new LGBTQ advisor

Dr. Leah Fygetakis has been appointed the new Director of LGBTQ Programs and Services.  She began work this January.

Fygetakis holds a Ph.D. in counseling psychology from the Ohio State University and a graduate certificate from the Massachusetts School of Professional Psychology.  Fygetakis worked as a trained psychologist at Boston University for the past 18 years and served as the director of the University's Counseling and Wellness Center for 14 of those years.  

Student-led LGBTQ organizations Spectrum and Wellesley for Equality each had at least one representative involved with the hiring process for the new Director of LGBTQ Programs and Services.

"We are very happy to say that we were able to say who would best fit our needs," Spectrum president Ariana Zarate '11, said in an e-mail.  "Because we got to read through and vote on the applicants and meet finalists, we feel that Leah's appointment as the new LGBTQ adviser was an example of administration and students working together."

As Wellesley's Director of LGBTQ Programs and Services, Fygetakis expects to collaborate with the administration and student organizations to create programs "in a model of celebrating diversity for all."  Fygetakis also plans to reach out beyond the LGBTQ community to raise awareness of LGBTQ issues.

"Leah is very perceptive and will be meeting with students, faculty and staff here at Wellesley to make her own observations about the needs of our community," Director of Residential & Campus Life Kristine Niendorf said.  "The ultimate goal is to reach as many students as possible, and I know she will have creative ideas to do this work."

Fygetakis has committed to regularly holding open office hours for students.  "I want students to tell me what they think the campus needs and what they need," she said.  "I'd [also] like to hear from faculty and staff," she added.  

According to Zarate, the best way to determine the campus needs is through a survey.  Mission Change, an LGBTQ organization made up of both Spectrum and Wellesley for Equality members, conducted a survey two years ago that Zarate believes should be replicated.  

Moving forward, Zarate has at least one other specific goal in mind: she hopes to work with Fygetakis to deal with how the Admissions Office handles LGBTQ issues.  "The people with whom I've spoken feel like the Admissions Office tries to ignore or downplay the gay community at Wellesley," she said.  "As Leah familiarizes herself with Wellesley and listens to the concerns of the students, I think that eventually we will be able to work together on this conflict."

Fygetakis also recognizes that some students face "extra layers of challenge."

"I know that our students of color [who identify as LGBTQ] sometimes face this split in their identities," she said.  "It's hard to feel that you belong in either community."  She hopes to work with Harambee House and the Assistant Dean of Latina Students.

Fygetakis can attest to struggling with identity from personal experience.

"I was very challenged when I came out to myself in being Greek and being a lesbian," she said.  "I have a profound appreciation for what it's like when one strongly identifies with their ethnicity and [the ethnicity's] culture is not open to the concept of sexual orientation.  It's a work in progress.  You have to move through the world with that full identity and be prepared for disappointments and surprise within [your] ethnic community."

According to Fygetakis, people expected it to be easy for her to come out as a Greek lesbian.  Citing Sappho, they would claim that Greeks practically "invented homosexuality."    

But that is "hardly the culture at all."  According to Fygetakis, 97 percent of Greeks identify as Greek Orthodox, including herself.  Fygetakis experienced conflict with the highly traditional Orthodox Church while she was writing a chapter for a book about Greek-American lesbians' coming-out process.  While she wanted to directly quote the Orthodox Observer, the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America's monthly newspaper, she needed permission to exceed the word quota for her published article.  When she contacted her editors, however, the issue turned from simple mechanics to the content of her publication.  

"It went from editor to supervisor to the archbishop himself," she said.  "Ultimately the editor told me, ‘I'm sorry, but you cannot quote from our paper.'"

Fygetakis' intent was not to paint the Church in a bad light.  "I didn't want to interpret the article.  That's why I directly wanted to quote it."

Fygetakis described the experience of getting refused as "deeply difficult."  She experienced similar difficulty when organizing the baptism of her twin sons through the Greek Orthodox Church.  "I wanted to do it with full understanding [of the structure of her family]."  But this understanding quickly proved evasive.

"I can't tell you how many doors were shut on me," she recalled.  Fygetakis eventually found a Greek Orthodox priest in Portsmouth, N.H., who welcomed her.

Outside of Wellesley, Fygetakis works part-time as an executive coach in leadership development with the Social Innovation Forum, a philanthropy program of a consulting firm that mobilizes non-profit organizations.  Since her appointment as Director of LGBTQ Programs and Services, she has been impressed with the leadership opportunities open to students on campus.

"Students [at Wellesley] are empowered," she said.  "If [they] want to do something, it seems that you just start it up and do it and staff are here to help support in any way.  There doesn't seem to be a lot of layers of bureaucracy."