January 11, 2013
Gabe Javier
- Year of Graduation and Concentration: MA, Higher Education Administration 2005
- First Job: Educational and Training Intern, Sexual Assault Prevention and Awareness Center – University of Michigan; Assistant Director, Office of LGBT Affairs- University of Michigan
- Current Job: Assistant Dean of Students and Director, LGBT Campus Center- University of Wisconsin, Madison
Advice to current UM students
Make a personal board of directors. These are folks that you constantly bounce ideas and decisions off of, they serve as a sounding board at major crossroads of your life and help you stay grounded and remember your roots. These are the folks that, even though a year has passed, you can still call or email and feel as if you spoke to them just yesterday. Michigan is full of these folks – connect with them. Once you have these people, keep in touch with them.
Don’t be afraid of your own awesomeness, and remember you didn’t get there by yourself. When you get ready to graduate or move on from U-M, make a list of people to thank and write them a card (not an email – a card!) Lots of people have invested in you, from your parents upward, there are tons of people who don’t expect your thanks, which is why you should thank them.
Biggest challenge you have faced in the workforce
One of the biggest challenges that I’ve had to face was to lean into my own expertise, but also remember that I have a lot to learn yet. I was hesitant at first to speak with confidence about things that I know well – whether it is writing and delivering workshops, talking about the experiences of LGBTQ people or even connecting with other professionals. Sure, part of it was an age thing (“I’m too young to know anything!”), but it’s really about expressing and exercising the things that you’ve learned and applying them out in the world. Sooner or later I came to the realization that, yeah, I was using what I learned and that I wasn’t bullsh!tting. Then there comes a humbling moment where you come to the stark realization that there is so much more to learn. So I guess the biggest challenge thus far, I think, is finding that balance.
How have your multiple identities influenced your life and work?
My multiple identities have been central to my lived experiences – personally and professionally. I am literally in my line of work – LGBT Student Services – because I did not see any people “like me” when I started to come out. Filipino, Catholic, Midwestern, people of size were simply not part of the spectrum of experience – or at least that is what I thought. That was just the beginning – as I’ve grown and heard the stories and experiences of other people and how they encounter their multiple, intersecting, beautiful identities I learn a new way to encounter my own. The goal isn’t just to say – ‘yes, I have multiple identities and they intersect’ – but to stand at that intersection and figure out how the world looks from that intersection and what new things you can learn about yourself.
One of the most essential and difficult things about my personal experience as a gay man of color was dis-identifying and then re-defining for myself what it meant to be a gay man and a man of color. The master narrative for LGBTQ people in America did not match my lived experience, so I had to interrogate those ideas and learn to be confident in my own story.