By Tara Cavanaugh
Alex Krasicky, 19, works as an intern at Transgender Michigan as a part her service on the AmeriCorps HIV/AIDS Team Detroit.
Tell us about Transgender Michigan. What does it do?
Our main mission is to improve the lives of transgender individuals in Michigan. Some of the things that we do most are speaking engagements and workshops to educate the general public and companies about transgender individuals and the challenges they face and about having a proper protocol for dealing with transgender employees. We also have an online resource called Trans Pages and those are an index of Michigan businesses that are trans friendly. That includes places like doctors offices, clothing stores, restaurants, hair stylists. It's incredibly needed because I remember early in my transition I didn't know who to go to or what to do. It was invaluable.
What do you do there now?
My title is Program Services Coordinator, but I do everything. I'm running their first office in the Michigan AIDS Coalition building. A lot of what I've been doing is setting up our filing system, setting up our computer system, stuff like that.
What do you like best about Transgender Michigan?
What I like best is the sheer number of people you can meet through the organization. Not just employees, but also contacts that I've made through being involved. In the past week I went to Washington, D.C. for the Transgender Lobby Day Conference. And that involved going and sitting down with Senator Debbie Stabenow and John Dingell's chief of staff and talking to them about employment discrimination, especially in the trans community. Because of this job, I am now friends with individuals from all over the country. It's so interesting to get a nationwide perspective on transgender issues.
Right now I'm the only employee in the office, but I mostly work with Rachel Crandall and Susan Crocker and they have been fantastic. They're happy just to have me there, not only as a helper but they also love that I'm able to give a younger perspective on things because up until, say, 10 or 20 years ago, in the trans population the average age was a lot higher simply because of a lack of resources. With all of the resources available on the Internet, the age is getting younger and younger.
Do you plan to stay active in this kind of work in the future?
I definitely want to remain an activist in the trans community because it's going to be a long time before we don't need activism anymore. I think public health might be a consideration for me because the AmeriCorps team I'm on is HIV-specific, and I've learned so much about the prevalence of HIV and how we can prevent it from spreading.
Do you have any advice for the younger transgender population?
I would strongly encourage them to get involved, join your school's GSA, hook up with local trans-friendly organizations and just put yourself out there. It's a lot easier and a lot harder to be out in this day and age with the Internet, but the only way we're going to be able to effectively battle discrimination is to put ourselves out there.
