2025 Lavender Celebration

On May 26, 2026, HGSC Board Member Jim Jacobs delivered the following speech to celebrate Harvard's LGBTQ+ graduates and present this year's HGSC Award, given to a graduating senior from the College for their advocacy and service on behalf of Harvard's LGBTQ+ communities:

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My name is Jim Jacobs and I’m a director of the Harvard Gender and Sexuality Caucus.


With apologies,  let me start with a pitch: We hope that you -and all of you graduates - will become a member of HGSC (which you can do for free; just go to HGSC.ORG and look for the join button). HGSC is a terrific way to stay in touch, and get involved with our community of Harvard alumni, students, faculty, and staff. You can learn more about us and join online at HGSC.ORG.

Now on to the fun part: I am pleased to announce that BYRON GONZALEZ is the winner of this year’s HGSC Award. Warmest congratulations!
 

We heard from an impressive group of applicants and read about the incredible work they’ve each been doing with and on behalf of Harvard’s LGBTIQ+ community. But Byron’s application stood out among those of your peers.
 

Let me take a few moments to share with you the things that made Byron such a superlative candidate:
 

Byron is a  tireless advocate who has dedicated their time Harvard to creating a campus where all queer students can live their most authentic lives, Byron’s identities include being:
 

  • a Latine, gay, and nonbinary individual longing not just to be seen, but to belong.
  • Co-president of the Queer Students Association, where Byron has led efforts to elevate the voices of marginalized queer and trans individuals, especially those who are Black, Indigenous, or People of Color
  • Co-ordinator of weekly community events and sober party spaces and helping organize Queer Prom and Visitas Drag Night.
  • A valued Contributor to the Queer Students Association flagship mutual aid initiative – the Social Transition Fund – which annually distributes thousands of dollars to help trans and nonbinary students offset gender-affirming expenses.

Byron has observed that “these commitments are more than extracurricular—they are personal, necessary, and rooted in lived reality….. I’ve supported myself throughout college, often juggling three jobs at once. That labor has shaped my activism: I know what it means to show up tired, to advocate while stretched thin. But I’ve kept showing up—for my communities, because they’ve always shown up for me."
 

Congratulations, Byron, for leaving an indelible mark on the College and making us all proud.

It being graduation time - I want to add a few words to acknowledge the current stresses; to urge your personal involvement, while staying as safe as possible; to urge tolerance of others  and to welcome opportunities to engage in meaningful discussion with those with whom you disagree; and to remain hopeful. I think you are right if you believe these are indeed aberrant times, never seen before in American politics and courts). So it is especially important that you be and remain involved. A great deal is at stake. Today it may not be the LGBQ+ community, but the trans community has already been targeted, and I would bet money that sooner or later the rest of us will be as well.
 

And one last thing.... I want to add a comment about hope. We are not at the end of history but in the middle of it. Again. The end is not yet written. Seeing what this community—and especially the students who have resurrected this year's Lavender Graduation —have done in two weeks, I am hopeful of the great and significant things we all can do,  together, and as individuals. 

Congratulations! And good luck!