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Support Community Care, Not Institutional Harm! Fund the Future of Queer and Trans Care!
Please consider donating if:
- You want to resist the anti-trans legislation sweeping the U.S.
- You believe queer and trans research should center care, collectivity, and liberation—not just suffering, illness, and subjugation.
- You want to support research that is community-driven, not extractive.
- You believe LGBTQIA+ care workers deserve to be paid for their wisdom and vision.
How do queer and trans social workers—many of whom entered the field to support their own communities—navigate the contradictions of working in LGBTQIA+-specific organizations that often replicate the same oppressive structures they aim to resist? How do care workers sustain collective care under institutions shaped by cisnormativity, white supremacy, carcerality, and capitalism?
This dissertation study, part of my PhD in Social Work at Columbia University, investigates these questions using Critical Participatory Action Research (CPAR). All participants will serve as co-researchers—not just study subjects, but collaborators who shape the research questions, interpret findings, and co-create what we learn together. Their lived experience and insight are central to every step of the process.
As a queer clinical social worker and longtime organizer, I’ve spent years working in LGBTQIA+ nonprofits, foster care spaces, and crisis lines. I’ve witnessed how queer and trans care workers—especially trans care workers of color—are asked to give endlessly while being undervalued and institutionally constrained. This study is designed to name those dynamics, build collective knowledge, and imagine liberatory forms of care rooted in community, within and beyond institutions.
I’m raising at least $5,000 to:
- Compensate 30 LGBTQIA+ co-researchers $150 each for participating in a 4-hour focus group workshop—an amount grounded in New York City’s cost of living and in the belief that trans and queer care workers deserve to be paid fairly for their time, insight, and labor.
- Offer additional honoraria for co-researchers who contribute to data analysis, writing, or dissemination.
- Redistribute any remaining funds to a Black trans-led grassroots organization.
For every $150 donated, one more queer or trans care worker will have the chance to join the study and be compensated for their time, labor, and wisdom.
In addition to seeking institutional funding, I am turning to community support to help fund this research—so that this work is not solely backed by institutions that have long underfunded and marginalized trans and queer futures.
This is research with and for the community. Every dollar helps build knowledge, healing, and connection outside of systems that continue to cause harm. Thank you for your support—we can’t, and wouldn’t want to, do this without you.
The conceptualization and plans for this study, outlined here, were approved by my dissertation committee (as follows) during my dissertation proposal defense in May 2024: Dr. Elwin Wu, PhD (Columbia), Dr. Nkemka Anyiwo, PhD (Columbia), Dr. Michelle Fine, PhD (CUNY Graduate Center), Dr. Myrl Beam, PhD (Macalester), Dr. Laura Wernick, PhD (Fordham).
Organizer
