BY WENDY SODERBURG
UCLA Today Staff
The impetus for Ronni Sanlo’s groundbreaking
work in lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) studies
began when she was just 11.
At the time, the popular television program
among kids was the “Spin and Marty” segment of “The
Mickey Mouse Club,” with Annette Funicello as the female
lead. “It was 1958, I was 11 years old, and I was in love
with Annette Funicello,” Sanlo said. “And I was
in trouble.”
Forty-four years later, Sanlo is no longer in
trouble; in fact, her work in LGBT studies has dovetailed nicely
with her background in education. As director of UCLA’s
Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender Campus Resource Center,
Sanlo has combined her skills to produce three books: “Working
with LGBT College Students” (1998); “Unheard Voices:
The Effects of Silence on Lesbian and Gay Educators” (1999);
and the newly published “Our Place on Campus” (2002),
which offers guidelines for establishing and operating LGBT
centers on college campuses.
Sanlo knows well how difficult it is to be a
gay student. For years she hid her homosexuality from family
and friends and behaved in “hyper-heterosexual ways”
throughout high school and college. Shortly after she graduated
from the University of Florida, Sanlo’s grandfather asked
her, “You’re almost 25 and you’re not married.
What are you, funny or something?” That remark prompted
Sanlo to call up a guy she’d dated in college and ask
him, “Do you still want to get married?” He said
yes, and they were married within three months; two months later,
she was pregnant.
Sanlo had two children during her seven-and-a-half-year
marriage, but lost custody of them when she came out in 1979.
She became politically active almost immediately, taking a job
as the HIV epidemiologist for the state of Florida. At the same
time, she earned master’s and doctoral degrees in education
from the University of North Florida.
In 1994, Sanlo became director of the LGBT office
at the University of Michigan, where she helped create the National
Consortium of Directors of LGBT Resources in Higher Education.
Three years later, she was persuaded to apply for the position
of director of UCLA’s LGBT center. “At first I wasn’t
interested, but when I finally came here to interview, I saw
things that I knew would present challenges for me,” she
said. “And I really wanted those challenges.”
One of the enticements was that Sanlo would
be allowed to teach. Through the Graduate School of Education
& Information Studies’ Teacher Education Program,
Sanlo teaches a required course, ED 405, which focuses on identity
and culture in education. And through her work at the LGBT center,
she conducts sensitivity training sessions for faculty, staff
and — indirectly — students.
“For example, I’ve been doing a
number of workshops about our transgender faculty and staff
for their departments,” Sanlo said. “I believe that
if we as faculty and staff are honoring each other in that way,
we’re translating that into honoring our students as well.
Students are learning the culture of this campus from us.”
