Harvard University Affiliates Mourn the Closure of the QuOffice

On Sept. 19, Harvard students and faculty gathered at the Cambridge Commons and held a pride flag at half-staff to hold a funeral for the University’s Office of BGLTQ Student Life, often endearingly called the “QuOffice.” The ceremony was organized by the Harvard Undergraduate Queer Advocates and the Queer Students Association.

The QuOffice, alongside the Women’s Center and the Foundation for Intercultural and Race Relations, was suddenly closed over the summer. Its staff were reassigned to the Harvard Foundation, a group operating under the newly formed Office of Culture and Community.

“The Dean of Students Office has undertaken incredible work figuring out how we can support our entire community during these fraught times,” Harvard College Dean David Deming ’10 wrote in an email to students and faculty on Sept. 2. “Earlier this summer, we opened the Office of Culture and Community. I know that this is a big change for many people, and I ask for your forbearance as we chart the path forward.”

This change followed a series of attacks by the Trump administration, including a letter sent to Harvard President Alan Garber ’76 on April 11. 

“The University must immediately shutter all diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) programs, offices, committees, positions, and initiatives, under whatever name, and stop all DEI-based policies, including DEI-based disciplinary or speech control policies, under whatever name,” Josh Gruenbaum, Commissioner of the Federal Acquisition Service, Sean R. Keveney, Acting General Counsel for the Department of Health and Human Services, and Thomas E. Wheeler, Acting General Counsel for the Department of Education, wrote in the letter.

The QuOffice, which was most recently located in Thayer’s basement, offered a physical safe space for queer students on campus.

“The Harvard College Office of BGLTQ Student Life provides support, resources, and leadership development for bisexual, gay, lesbian, transgender, queer, and questioning students,” the Harvard Kenneth C. Griffin Graduate School of Arts and Sciences website states. “Through collaboration with students, staff, and faculty across the College, the Office creates opportunities for fellowship, community building, and thoughtful dialogue.” 

The website also addresses the purpose of the QuOffice before its closure, adding, “We seek to foster a safer, more inclusive campus by educating and engaging the Harvard community about the multiplicity of sexual and gender identities.”

At the funeral, students, tutors, and other faculty members delivered speeches to the dozens of affiliates in attendance, sharing their sentiments about the closure of QuOffice. Among the student speakers were lead organizers Hannah Niederriter ’26 and Amber Simons ’26, as well as former QuOffice intern Aaryan Rawal ’26.

The event also included a community art project, which invited attendees to write messages on pieces of paper and fold them into paper cranes, which were placed in a symbolic coffin.

Students at the funeral described the ways that the QuOffice had supported their Harvard journey. “It was the first time that I was able to be in a physical space that was dedicated to people like me,” Niederriter said in an interview with the Independent. “Coming from rural Pennsylvania, that wasn’t something I ever had back home.”

Similar to Niederriter, Simons found a community in the QuOffice after coming to Harvard from Texas. “The shutdown of the QuOffice represents the erasure of queer voices, and that’s really what we’re mourning: what it represented and what it means now that it’s shut down,” Simons told the Independent.

The QuOffice first opened its doors in March 2012, following a year of effort by Dean Evelynn M. Hammonds ’93 and the BGLTQ Working Group. This working group, established in October 2010, also introduced a full-time Director of BGLTQ Student Life and a BGLTQ Advisory Committee. The QuOffice’s establishment responded to student protests advocating for a physical space for BGLTQ students to gather, find community, and access resources.

For those it served, the QuOffice was a valuable center for students to connect with each other, celebrate queer joy, and share important information. 

“In the QuOffice, I was able to meet people who were equally passionate about creating spaces that were comfortable for queer students, making sure resources got out there—especially ones related to the social transition fund or health insurance that is queer-affirming—and all of those resources that needed to be shared out that Harvard wasn’t necessarily so vocal about,” Niederriter said.

The QuOffice faced its share of criticism, including from its own students. “The QuOffice did have its problems, and it was not a perfect space,” Simons explained. 

Rawal found that it often fell short when it came to fulfilling the needs of queer students and addressing certain issues within the Harvard community. 

“If you were to ask queer people when they visited the QuOffice, the answer is that we came here during our first semester when we lived on the Yard, we occasionally stopped by if we needed snacks and free printing, and that’s about it,” Rawal said in an interview with the Independent. “And yet, we have so many issues in our community that we’re all aware of but have never been articulated and we’ve never actually done any work to make real progress on them.” 

Despite this, they wished that Harvard had instead decided to “figure out a way to do better” and to “come together as a community” rather than close the QuOffice.

“Part of making Harvard the place that it is is by making sure that students are comfortable here,” Niederriter said. “If Harvard cannot embrace the queer student identity, then it is not a place that should be admired the way that it is.”

For many of those who benefitted from the resources the QuOffice offered, their biggest concern was the lack of support future BGLTQ Harvard students may feel.“I feel so sad on behalf of incoming students who don’t have that space that I had and won’t be able to use that as a transition,” Simons said.

Organizers wanted the Harvard community to know, above all, that the closing of the QuOffice does not mean the end of Harvard’s BGLTQ+ community. “We’re not going anywhere,” Simons said. “It is now more important than ever to continue this kind of work and advocacy.” Queer organizations, they added, are still present on campus. 

The Harvard Foundation, located in Grays Basement, is meant to “serve the entire Harvard College community by ensuring that each student is treated with equal dignity and respect.”

According to its website, “the Foundation will support programming that showcases the wide spectrum of life experiences within the Harvard College community and fosters student engagement with different perspectives, values, and identities.” LGBTQ students are not mentioned explicitly on the Office of Culture and Community page or the Harvard Foundation page on the Dean of Students’ office website.

To Rawal, this is an opportunity nonetheless for students, especially freshmen, to get more involved with the BGLTQ+ community and advocacy on campus. 

“What I want first-year students to know is that they still have a lot of power,” Rawal said. “And it’s important that they use that power to try to imagine better for our community, even if ultimately Harvard has failed us.”

Addy Anyaosah ’28 (addyanyaosah@college.harvard.edu) and Lucy Duncan ’28 (lduncan@college.harvard.edu) write News for the Independent.