Marlene Wayar and Violeta Alegre, leading figures in the trans and travesti movement, graduated this week from the Diploma in Gender, Politics, and Participation at the National University of General Sarmiento (UNGS). Amid laughter and dancing, they received their diplomas on the university campus, located in Los Polvorines, Malvinas Argentinas district, in the northeastern part of Greater Buenos Aires. By: Natalia Biazzini, from Los Polvorines (Malvinas Argentinas, Buenos Aires Province). Photos: Pablo Cittadini.   Marlene Wayar and Violeta Alegre celebrated their graduation this week from the Diploma in Gender, Politics, and Participation. During 2015, at the campus of the National University of General Sarmiento (UNGS) in Los Polvorines (Malvinas Argentinas, Buenos Aires Province), they learned about feminist and queer theories, the socio-historical construction of cultural gender norms, social policies and the public agenda, gender violence, non-sexist education, economics, migration, and project design: from initiatives for working in institutions to draft legislation . After the deaths of two iconic activists, Diana Sacayán and Lohana Berkins, Marlene is now one of the leaders of the collective. She was a founder of El Teje, the first newspaper made by and for trans women. She has worked and collaborated with various media outlets and is a driving force behind Latin American Trans Theory. Violeta worked for the United Nations and is currently a consultant for the World Bank. They knew each other from activism but strengthened their bond when they met again during the diploma program and became inseparable. Marlene had already participated in neighborhood assemblies with half of the faculty. One of the reasons she enrolled was to "systematize" her activism. "When we were activists, we didn't realize we were creating content. We were fighting, like when Lohana Berkins and I were fighting to get into the National Women's Meeting," Marlene said. She added that the diploma program provided her with tools for planning public policies. "You have gender awareness and you have a diagnosis, but often the failure lies in inaction. And with the diploma program, we discovered that sometimes, by getting involved in the cracks, meeting people in different parts of the government, you can collectively create a tiny project whose impact will always be medium to high." Violeta shared how the program strengthened her through new connections and also how it opened up job opportunities for her. “I was going through some personal issues that were really getting me down, and I needed to understand some aspects of the system. I came from activism, from being a grassroots activist in Malvinas Argentinas, but I felt quite alone and disoriented. I didn't know where to turn, what organization to join, and a friend told me about the diploma program,” she said. “It's a personal transformation and an experience that impacts everyone differently, and it also provides support.” Her partner, Sebastián Zoroastro, connected her with a project to systematize the public policies of the National Ministry of Labor at the United Nations. The diplomas were awarded after the integration of the Gender Identity Law at UNGS, which involved modifying the regulations of several internal procedures and which not all universities adopted. “General Sarmiento University showed the political will to expand in every sense. They worked on the degree program so that Marlene now has her diploma with her self-identified name, because she didn't legally change her name,” Violeta explained as they both made their way through the crowd that approached to greet and congratulate them. Marlene disagreed with how the Gender Identity Law was implemented. She believes it was decided unilaterally and not agreed upon by activist groups, as was the case with the Media Law. She wants her ID to say “transvestite.”

The students who give lectures

This year, Violeta and Marlene also participated in the teacher training program. They taught the subject of Diversity. “It was very enriching. I'm very self-taught. My first qualification is as a ceramics teacher; I have pedagogical skills, but I never pursued formal certification. My dream was to teach children and teenagers, and it seemed impossible to me that a mother and father would bring their children to me to teach them ceramics. Later, life led me to teach in informal settings, and I taught about gender, diversity, and human rights, but never like this year, at the General Sarmiento University,” said Marlene. Along with other classmates, Marlene and Violeta worked together on their final project for the diploma program. They focused on the inclusion of trans people in public universities in the province of Buenos Aires. “We worked on how to facilitate access to the institutions and how to reach out to them through the universities. We also envisioned a support network during the course of study, always keeping in mind the specific needs of trans identities within the institution,” Alegre explained. She cited the Mocha Celis Trans Popular High School—where most of the students are part of the transvestite, transsexual, and transgender community—in the City of Buenos Aires as a precedent, and spoke about the importance of building networks with spaces like this.

A diploma program to strengthen gender rights

“The goal of the program is to contribute to the expansion and guarantee of gender rights,” Marisa Fournier, the sociologist in charge of the diploma program, told Presentes. “It’s a diploma program that raises the agenda of the feminist movement, the sexual diversity movement, and the trans movement. The entire program structure is governed by the issues that these same groups of women, transvestites, trans people, and sexual diversity put on the agenda. The fact that an academic curriculum is guided and oriented by what these movements say about the situation that affects them has a structuring political foundation,” she added. During the graduation ceremony, Gabriela Diker, Rector of UNGS, highlighted the educational and productive roles of the diploma programs. He emphasized the importance of these spaces in the current national context: “These are not easy times, or rather, these are times when the temptation to change the course of where institutions are headed is very close. And yet, when this university decides to uphold these proposals, continue expanding them, and rethink them, what we are doing is the best thing a public institution like a university can do.” The afternoon Marlene, Violeta, and their classmates graduated, diplomas were also awarded for seven other programs: Communication and Photojournalism, Visual Arts Production and Management, Dance, and Human Rights. In the latter, Silvana Aranda and Flavia Battistiol, director of Human Rights in Escobar, received their certificates today. Both are daughters of disappeared Peronist activists. They are searching for their siblings, born in Campo de Mayo, one of the largest clandestine centers of detention, torture, and extermination during the last civic-military dictatorship, located ten kilometers from the university. This diploma program in Gender, Politics, and Participation—completely free of charge—prioritizes student diversity among its selection criteria. This year's students included female gendarmes, municipal officials, school and university teachers, and journalists. Registration for 2017 is open, and applicants can register here: http://www.ungs.edu.ar/ms_ungs/?page_id=15406

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