Transgender Day of Visibility – March 31, 2026

Transgender (Trans) Day of Visibility has been observed on March 31 every year since 2010 to raise awareness about transgender people and celebrate their lives, while also recognizing the ongoing discrimination and violence the community faces. The Sexual Violence Prevention and Response Office (SVPRO) which is part of the Equity and Inclusion Office (EIO) affirm our support for trans, nonbinary, and gender-diverse members of our university community.

Trans and queer postsecondary students continue to experience discrimination and harassment¹ and sexual assault² at elevated rates compared to cisgender peers. Moreover, transgender students also appear to experience higher rates of discrimination based on other social identities compared to non-transgender students¹, highlighting the need to consider how intersectional oppressions uniquely influence subgroups within the transgender community³. For example, queer students of colour can experience discrimination within singular identity spaces, whereas having spaces and communities with which they can explore and express their multiple identities separately and simultaneously can be beneficial to their mental health³. This calls for students, staff, and faculty to ensure that McMaster community members are meaningfully included in spaces that recognize, affirm, and reflect their intersecting identities.

Trans educators in postsecondary settings have also shared experiences of discrimination and a longing for community grounded in shared (multiple) identities such as gender, race, and professional roles⁴. They have also emphasized the importance of an intersectional lens to better understand how trans faculty and staff with multiple marginalized identities may experience being trans in distinct ways⁴. For example, in this study⁴, a Black gender queer, gender non-conforming, non-binary trans-identified, masculine-of-center Associate Professor described feelings of exclusion within the trans community, noting that these experiences cannot be fully understood without an intersectional lens:

It’s not work for me to see and recognize the parallels in how racism works and how genderism works and how sexism works and how these other systems of oppression. It’s not hard for me to see the parallels and draw connection lines (p.154).

This year, SVPRO is proud to announce that the inaugural Campus Gender-Based & Sexual Violence Prevention Microgrant program supported the Towards Safer Digital Futures: Understanding Technology-Facilitated Violence Workshop that was hosted by McMaster PhD Candidate Alexis-Carlota Cochrane in collaboration with McMaster’s Women & Gender Equity Network as part of their Making Waves campaign week. This workshop addressed digital harms related to gender and sexuality.

Today and every day, SVPRO and EIO are in solidarity with trans and gender-diverse students, staff, and faculty. SVPRO welcomes all trans and gender-diverse students and employees to reach out to SVPRO if they have experienced gender-based or sexual violence and would like to receive support. Our website shares additional resources with the McMaster community, including identity-specific supports which encompass supports specific to the trans community.

We encourage members of the McMaster community to learn more about the experiences of transgender people, participate in programming dedicated to this community, and to challenge transphobia to create a safer and more inclusive campus. See our allyship guide below to identify the many ways you can support trans communities and individuals:

¹ Yang, J., & Stolzenberg, E. B. (2025). Discrimination, harassment, and bias in higher education: Disaggregating the experiences of LGBTQ+ students. New Directions for Higher Education, 2025(210), 37-46.
² Steele, B., Martin, M., Sciarra, A., Melendez-Torres, G. J., Degli Esposti, M., & Humphreys, D. K. (2024). The prevalence of sexual assault among higher education students: A systematic review with meta-analyses. Trauma, Violence, & Abuse, 25(3), 1885–1898. https://doi.org/10.1177/15248380231196119
³ Duran, A. (2019). Queer “and” of color: A systematic literature review on queer students of color in higher education scholarship. Journal of Diversity in Higher Education, 12(4), 390–400. https://doi.org/10.1037/dhe0000084
⁴Simmons, S. L. (2016). ” I am because we are”: A portrait of trans* postsecondary educators’ experiences in higher education (Doctoral dissertation, Loyola University Chicago).