As an undergrad at Southern Illinois University in Carbondale, Zach Ricketson wanted to go Greek, but he couldn’t find a fraternity whose value system aligned with his.
Born with an independent streak, Ricketson realized that, instead of compromising his vision, he wanted to build his own community. He went on to help start a new local chapter of Tau Kappa Epsilon at SIU, which he said admitted individuals of all ages and disciplines and that, before it even received its official charter, boasted the largest number of members in TKE history.
“I’ve always been an odd duck, a unicorn in some respects,” Ricketson said, adding: “I’ve just always tended to be quite independent in my approach.”
Watching the fraternity’s membership balloon solidified for Ricketson the importance of community. After finishing his journalism degree, and moving out to Chicago — where he spent six years working at Cars.com and now works in brand marketing for Cresco Labs, a medical marijuana firm — Ricketson was looking for his people.
Website development as a volunteer effort
In February 2018, Ricketson joined Out In Tech Chicago, a nonprofit that aims to connect LGBTQ+ tech professionals. Out In Tech has chapters across 10 cities in the U.S., including New York, Los Angeles and Austin. In Chicago, Ricketson serves as the lead volunteer, where he organizes panel discussions, networking events and, on September 28, Chicago’s first ever “Digital Corps” initiative, where volunteer software engineers, designers and copywriters will build websites for five LGBTQ+ advocacy organizations at home and abroad.
These Wordpress.com sites are free, and Out In Tech provides free hosting for them for five years, along with a custom user guide so individual groups can maintain their sites themselves. Organizations apply to receive a free website through Digital Corps.
Over the years, Out In Tech has built websites for more than 100 organizations, including the Transgender Welfare Equity and Empowerment Trust (TWEET) Foundation in India — a charity that advocates for transgender rights, and some of whose founders live openly with HIV.
Although Out In Tech has pioneered the initiative for the last four years, this week’s Digital Corps represents the first time the program has come to Chicago. About 30 Chicagoans will help build the new websites this year.
Websites are key to fundraising and community
Gary Goldman, program director for the national Out In Tech nonprofit, said he developed the Digital Corps program in 2016, inspired by his time working and traveling as a consultant for the United Nations. His travels often took him to places with stringent anti-homosexuality laws.
During a trip to Uganda, Goldman met with Pepe Julian Onziema, an LGBTQ+ rights activist who identifies as a transgender man and who organized gay pride celebrations in the conservative African country. Goldman asked Onziema how he could support him. Onziema replied that he needed a better website.
“It made me realize the importance of the web platform as a fundraising mechanism and as a way for folks to feel less lonely in environments where they’re rejected,” Goldman said.
Onziema’s ask inspired Goldman to pitch Digital Corps to Out In Tech. Goldman credits the initiative for now helping grow the group’s national membership to more than 25,000 people.
It is still legal in about 30 states in the United States to discriminate against workers for their sexual orientation or gender identity.”
When Digital Corps first launched, Out In Tech volunteers focused solely on building websites for organizations based in countries where homosexuality is illegal — in some cases even punishable by death — or where LGBTQ+ people face persecution.
But in 2017, when President Donald Trump announced that June would be Great Outdoors Month and National Homeownership Month — ignoring the month’s traditional focus on queer pride — Goldman decided to move Digital Corps’ work to the U.S.
Out In Tech volunteers built websites for 10 U.S. organizations focused on LGBTQ+ rights that year, including the Massachusetts Transgender Political Coalition, a group that helps transgender and gender-nonconforming people change their names and genders marker on official documents, like driver’s licenses.
“It is still legal in about 30 states in the United States to discriminate against workers for their sexual orientation or gender identity, so it is still not fully safe to be out at work,” Goldman said, adding that federal lawmakers are still debating whether an employer can fire an individual for being LGBTQ+.
“That’s why it’s vital to have spaces where you can be with your community, learn about employers that are LGBTQ-friendly, learn about your rights and then also be comfortable,” Goldman said. “A lot of energy is spent for marginalized communities thinking about how they should present, how people are going to receive them, not feeling safe.”
Fellowships, scholarships, mentoring and more
Goldman said local Out In Tech chapters, like the one in Chicago, provide a safe space for LGBTQ+ tech professionals to be themselves and connect with jobs.
The group also offers a fellowship program to help tech companies hire interns who identify as LGBTQ+. Last summer, Goldman said IBM hired three Out In Tech fellows. The nonprofit also operates a national scholarship program that awards 10 people the chance to study at the Flatiron School, a coding academy with 10 locations across the U.S.
Goldman said that, almost every time Out In Tech hosts a panel discussion at a company, members from the firm’s human resources team are there to network with attendees. Orbitz recently hosted a panel about travel tech innovations and safety tips for LGBTQ+ individuals while abroad. Bank of America hosted another talk on finance and technology. By having company HR reps on hand, Goldman said Out In Tech aims increase queer representation in the industry — tech, he said, is still dominated by cisgender, white, straight men.
When you look at the leadership positions, you rarely see queer people at the very top.”
“One of my biggest pet peeves is just the lack of data that we have around LGBTQ people,” Goldman said. “We do know that women are underrepresented and that people of color are underrepresented. When you look at the leadership positions, you rarely see queer people at the very top.”
To address this, the nonprofit this year started Qorporate, a resource for the some 30 companies that have signed on to learn how to start employee resource groups for LGBTQ+ individuals, offering advice on how to structure company culture and HR initiatives. Out In Tech also offers a remote mentorship program nationwide. Ricketson said he hopes to soon add an in-person mentorship program in Chicago — a city he described as a growing tech hub.
“I’m 34, I grew up in the corn fields of central Illinois,” Ricketson said. “I didn’t necessarily have these opportunities and these groups weren’t necessarily available to me. If I had known that groups like this existed, it could’ve had a huge impact on me.”
