Virtual Transgender Day of Visibility

Description

A DIY Virtual Resource Fair (in the response to COVID-19)
Created & led by Midwest Trans & Nonbinary Community Leaders

Featuring:

• Skill Building Workshops
• Panel Conversations
• Community Conversations & Check-Ins
• Livestream Performances

Its A Choose-Your-Own-Adventure Style Webinar

One Link, Your Schedule, All Day.

You will receive sign in information for the webinar once you register.  Please feel free to sign in and out throughout the day.

International Trans Day of Visibility
A Virtual Resource Fair & Community Conversations (in the time of COVID-19)
 
Virtual Trans Day of Visibility 2020 Planning Committee:
Marsha Riley, Suzanne Wheeler, Leon Harden, JD Bezares, Riley Long & Merrique Jenson
 
Virtual Trans Day of Visibility 2020 Hosts: 
Merrique Jenson, Nyla Foster, Gia Bleu, Joss Barton
 
9:00am                  Welcome
9:15 - 9:45am       Total Conditioning Class
                               Hailee Bland-Walsh (City Gym), This morning fitness class will cover a very basic, at-home workout that can support our health and wellness. This class is meant to be accessible to most folks without gym equipment and the instructor will be available to help answer questions for participants. 

11:00 - 11:25am     Hair Care & Grooming DIY Tips
                                Kate Van Vleck (him.her.them hair studio), This workshop will cover discovering and creating styles that work best for each individual person, with special care towards trans and nonbinary beauty. This workshop is taught from the perspective of a nonbinary and genderfluid, established stylist, they will be showing styling tips and tricks and things from easy items participants may keep at their homes to allow our hair to be healthy and looking its best while remaining low-cost.
11:35 - 12:20pm     Ask A Therapist: Skills, Support & Check-In With Trans & Nonbinary Folks
                                Scott Xavier Feiker, LPC, LMHC & Becky Rosenthal, LCSW, Moderated by Nyla Foster & Merrique Jenson, This session will focus on the emotional & mental health needs of trans and nonbinary people. The session will begin with a community check-in and the two therapists, both who are members of the LGBTQ community and have a professional practice that center t affirming care for trans and nonbinary clients will be available to provide guidance, hear concerns, share resources and help us center ourselves. The session will be lightly moderated and guided by trans women of color and the resources collected during the session will become available to folks after.
12:30 - 12:55  pm    Budgeting & Financial Readiness (in time of COVID-19)
                                 Alex Salazaar & Suzanne Wheeler, This workshop will be focused on teaching participants how to plan their finances, including preparing an emergency fund. Presenters will discuss how to navigate the bank system, including working through name changes. Participants will be provided resources, examples of budget sheets and be able to ask questions to navigate potential expense readiness during this unprecedented time.
1:05 - 1:45pm     Centering on our Trans Elders during COVID-19
                             Carmen Xavier, Samantha Ruggles, Luc Bensimòn, Sayer Johnson, & Korea Kelly, Moderated by Joss Barton, This workshop will center on ways we can uplift and support and listen to our transgender and gender nonbinary elders. Panelists will share how multi-generational bonds between trans elders and trans youth is an important part of both trans history and trans advocacy. What can trans elders and their personal experiences teach all us about survival, resiliency, love, loss, and hope.
1:55 - 2:35pm    Loc'D N' Loaded: Food, Finances, and Frequency
                            Melissa Brown & CiCi Glasgow, This workshop provides an introduction on how to grow food, prioritize finances, and raise your frequency while practicing social distancing!  We will center on Black, Indigenous and queer & trans people of color voices and cultural experiences in this workshop, led by two bad-ass black queer women. 
2:45 - 3:10pm              Non-Religious Expression of Spirit & Connecting to Other
                                        Ryan Wilks, How do we as queer, trans and nonbinary people find spiritual solace in dark times, and why is it important to nurture our queer spirits? For many of us, as trans and queer people, we may not find comfort in prayer or religious expression,  when in fact, many of us have religious trauma from having participated in these faiths when we were younger. This workshop will address these experiences and guide participants to identify useful ways to engage their own queer spirit as well as what a queer expression of spirituality may look like.
3:20 - 3:50pm    Get ready (in Clown Makeup!) with Wrestle Yr Friends
                            Jamie Leonard & Kailee Karr (Wrestle Yr Friends), Join Wrestle Yr Friend’s performers, the talented Salty Fears & referee Woke Hogan, as Woke transforms Sally through a “Clown Face” look from an undisclosed location (thank you quarantine!). Woke doesn’t do makeup ever to Salty’s daily decorated face-- so what could go wrong?? Follow along at home! Learn some easy (and comedic) makeup tutorials with stuff you can find around your home. Feel free to post a selfie with your final look and tag us! WRESTLE YR FRIENDS is a queer collective of artists, activists, entertainers, and generally badass humans of KC who wanna actually grapple with you.
4:00-4:40pm    Supporting Trans & Nonbinary Youth in Care (during COVID-19)
                         A Youth Care Worker Panel featuring Ash R. Allee, LMSW (reStart) Nyla        Foster (SAVE, Pride Haven) and Seth Middleton (Foster Adopt Connect), Moderated by Merrique Jenson, This panel conversation will center on the experiences of three trans youth care workers in the Kansas City region. Participants will learn from them about the on-the-ground experiences of youth shelters, LGBTQ drop-in centers, emergency placement, navigating the foster care and child welfare system (in the time of COVID-19.) As best-practices and our new norm on how to do culturally-responsive youth care work are quickly changing, this workshop will also focus on questions that participants have for the panelists, guided with the help of the moderator.
4:50 - 5:15pm    Safer Binding & At-Home Care Tips
                              Andy Chapel (The Union), Chest binding is no joke, y’all! It can help one’s pursuit of gender euphoria, but even the most well-fitting, high-quality binder can cause discomfort and damage over the long term. This workshop will discuss harm reduction methods based on community experience and a published, peer-reviewed study on chest binding. Additionally, opportunities will be given to participate in breathing and stretching techniques that can help your body stay healthy while binding. The leader of this workshop is not a healthcare professional and this should not replace medical advice, these techniques are frequently used by athletes and professional musicians to gain better control of their bodies and breathing. This workshop is targeted towards transmasculine individuals, but would also be helpful for folks who work with TGNC youth or even those who wear compression garments such as tight sports bras or corsets.
5:25 - 5:50pm     Learning the Elements of Voguing 101
                            Trixxie Alain Mikli (KC Mother of the House of Alain Mikli), Join our local Legendary Butch Queen Up in Pumps to learn the basic five elements of voguing and some brief history of our rich Kansas City ballroom culture. Participants will be guided through the basics of  catwalk, hands, spins and dips, duckwalks, and floor performance. Mother will be available for questions and to offer feedback & affirmations to participants as they practice and show off their stunts from home.
6:00 - 7:00pm    Trans 101 Allyship Training (for Cis-folks)                     
                            Riley Long, Trans 101 is a quick training geared towards cisgender allies that are looking to support trans and nonbinary individuals in their lives. We will introduce basic definitions and explain identities from within the trans and gender-expansive community, share information about medical and social transitioning, and encourage strategies allies can use to uplift the trans and gender-expansive communities. We encourage participants to come with questions as well and will try to get to them within this presentation.
7:00 - 7:15pm    Greetings from TDOV Hosts & Mid-America LGBT Chamber of Commerce                             Suzanne Wheeler & Marsha Riley  
7:15 - 7:30pm    Special Guest Speaker        
7:30 - 7:45pm    Performance & excerpts from “The Wagons Ain't Here Yet…”
                           Joss Barton (Spoken Word Performance Artist) 
7:45 - 8:45pm     A Sisterhood Conversation on Resiliency, Financial Survival &         Resource Sharing 
                            Trans Women of Color Panelists ft. Gia Bleu, Kelly Nou & Essence Hale;        Moderated by Nyla Foster & Merrique Jenson, This sisterhood conversation will explore the long histories and the current state of mutual aid networks and community-based survival strategies unique to transgender women of color. Our sisters have led the way in creating underground networks of resources meant to advance our’ financial, educational, sexual, mental, physical,  spiritual health and well-being. Panelists will discuss how they have interacted with, learned from, and expanded these networks in their trans families and communities, as well as offering new concepts of how trans folks might advance these legacies in an age of social isolation and distancing due to the Coronavirus pandemic.
8:45- 9:45pm    How Do We Use Art & Performance to Heal
                             Featuring Trans & Nonbinary artists & performers, featuring Dick Von Dyke,    Lila Star Escada, Merrique Jenson & a very special guest (TBA),  Moderated by Joss Barton,     How do trans* artists collaborate, inspire, and create resilience in our environments and communities while facing the isolation and fears under an age of coronavirus? Artists will share the changing strategies, concepts, imaginations, desires, and anxieties transgender and non*binary artists are facing in their arts practice, arts communities, and arts collaborations while practicing self-isolation and quarantines. Artists will also examine how trans art and trans artists can be an important tool in confronting the violence, fear, and propaganda which permeates today’s societal environment.
9:45 - 10:00pm    Closing Thoughts with Moderators / Final Performance by Joss Barton