Our First Outing, A Recap

Many of us braved the torrential downpour yesterday to attend Out at Morningstar's first meeting at Bin 36. If you missed it, or even if you didn't, here's a recap:

• We agreed upon a multi-faceted mission, which should help attract people with different interests. In addition to serving a social purpose for GLBT Morningstar employees, we'll also try to set our sights on the community at large too. Some ideas included identifying good volunteer opportunities at the Center on Halsted (which Shane O’Neil kindly volunteered to scope out for us) as well as networking with other related gay corporate groups around town (Jeremy Glaser mentioned there’s a gay financial network).

• Fortunately, there aren’t a lot of things we need to push for within the company, but we did agree that Morningstar’s HRC rating needs improving. If you knew nothing about our company, you’d think this place was a somewhat hostile environment for gays. The main reason we don’t score well isn’t because of how we treat gender identity (there aren’t any health benefits, such as surgical or hormonal therapy, for transgendered people.) If you want to see how we stack up, you can see it here.

• Finally, we agreed we should at least meet on a monthly basis. We hope to make a big splash next month with a pride patio party sponsored, of course, by Out at Morningstar. I need to get clearance from facilities to host this on the patio, so it’s not official yet. But the tentative date is June 25, the Thursday before the parade. Given that we have no budget, we thought we’d charge a nominal amount (perhaps $5) for anyone who wants to come. Both Marc DeMoss and I are working on this, but your suggestions and help are more than welcome. Pulling this off will be something of a logistical feat, especially since we don’t really know how many people might come to the party. The party should be fun and raise visibility for our group. We’d have to do a good job promoting it.

If you have any other thoughts, questions, or feedback to offer, don’t hesitate to share!