Dr. Matthew Adams has heard that there are other LGBT staff members at the New Jersey Institute of Technology (NJIT), but he hasn’t met any of them.
“I know that there are very few of us,” says Adams, an assistant professor of civil engineering at NJIT.
Adams, who grew up near Manchester, New Hampshire, began identifying as gay when he was a teenager. He came out when he was 18, at which point he thought he would never again have to hide “in the closet.”
That was until he came to NJIT in the fall of 2015 to begin his career as a college professor. Adams describes the institution as a “fairly apolitical university” that is not “the most openly welcoming place.”
To be clear, he says, no one has said anything derogatory to him directly, and the university doesn’t necessarily have “an anti-gay bent,” but it also doesn’t have any faculty committees dedicated to diversity like other colleges of its size.
During his first term at NJIT, Adams felt it was better to not be open about his sexuality. Soon though, he realized, “I should be more vocal. I should be more visible — for any of my students who might be gay, to show them that you can be successful in this career and be out.”
Because the university didn’t offer such a course, Adams took a safe zones class online, which taught him best practices on cultivating an inclusive and respectful classroom for LGBTQ students.
