ESA 2024 Inspire Session: Experiences and Recommendations from Transgender and Gender Nonconforming Students and Professionals in Field Ecology

Transgender and gender nonconforming (TGnC) scientists face many unique barriers to careers in field ecology. While traveling to field sites, body scanners at airports can trigger invasive pat-downs or harassment, and driving through states with restrictive laws may mean facing limited access to public restrooms or increased risks of harassment based on appearance. Even at field sites, the local laws targeting TGnC individuals can increase anxiety and risk, especially if medical emergencies arise. Humans can easily become one of the greatest field hazards. To address these barriers, we organized a series of presentations for a TGnC-focused session at the 2024 Annual Meeting of the Ecological Society of America in Long Beach, California. We explored the experiences of TGnC field ecologists and highlighted their resilience, challenges, and triumphs. Centering on three key themes—overcoming barriers, finding gender euphoria in fieldwork, and fostering allyship—we aimed to shed light on what it takes to create safer, more inclusive spaces in the field. Here, we summarize those presentations to continue amplifying the voices of TGnC ecologists across various career tracks and stages to inspire meaningful changes in the field ecology community. Over the past 6 years, I have worked numerous seasonal field jobs in different states with the goal of advancing my career in biology. For most of us, this is the reality of biology; we often travel to seek the best professional opportunities. About 3 years into this journey, I began transitioning from male to female and living as a woman. From then on, I had to make a particular effort to seek workplaces where I could do my best work untroubled by transphobia. I would like to share the process I used, with the hope it could be helpful to aspiring transgender scientists or allies who might want to know what it is like from our perspective. For transgender and other gender-nonconforming people, job-hunting is a minefield with many layers. The highest level we must consider is the country in which a job posting is located, then the state/province, the city, the institution or company, and finally, at the lowest level, is the actual people we will encounter at work. Each of these levels must be assessed on its own. It is important to note that transgender rights are eroding rapidly. As part of a broader anti-LGBT movement, hundreds of harmful bills are being introduced at the US state level each year. The decline that has occurred is stark. My transition began in 2021 while I worked for the Utah Department of Wildlife Resources. At the time, it was one of the few examples of "red states" that protected transgender state employees from discrimination. Now, it has one of the most extreme anti-trans laws of all, a "bathroom bill" that presents an extreme risk of danger to people like me. For the national level, I use websites like Equaldex that monitor the legal situation for the LGBT community in different countries. I check public opinion surveys and examine laws and news. For examining US states, I use the Movement Advancement Project and the Anti-Trans Legislative Risk Map. Data for individual cities can be found on City-Data. I assess LGBT-friendliness by looking at the city's electoral voting data as well as the overall LGBT population. I also search for local nonprofits and other community-based organizations that support the queer community, as these can provide important resources such as financial support, mental health counseling, and human connection. I judge the queer-friendliness of institutions by looking at the mission statements on their website. Does it specifically say they are committed to supporting transgender and/or gender-nonconforming people? Or is there just a vague commitment to "equality?" Any kind of LGBT symbols, or any overt statement of support for the queer community, can be considered a green flag. These days, saying nothing is not the same as neutrality, as our community is under attack. It is also worth looking to see if the institution has donated to queer organizations, or antiqueer organizations, as well as if it has any policies listed about trans healthcare for employees. Individual people such as supervisors can be assessed during the job interview. Some of the questions I frequently ask include: "What do you do to make this a good place for someone like me to work?" Believing your workplace to be fine for queer people is one thing. Being confident you have taken concrete actions about it is much better. "Do any trans people work here?" If yes, consider reaching out to them. "What would you do if a supervisor/another employee called me a ****?" In the event of serious transphobia such as calling you a slur, what procedure does your employer have in place to address it? "Will I be required to travel?" Do they seem aware that some places are dangerous for queer people? Were they expecting you to travel to one of those places? I like to essentially out myself as transgender on my job application by stating my involvement with the "Trans and Gender-nonconforming Fieldwork Alliance" on my CV. I would rather weed out the transphobes ahead of time. But it is important to note that not everyone can live like this. Some queer people must be discreet about their identities. Please remember that the decision to be out should be yours alone. It is important then to ask yourself if the workplace itself might out you. For example, in my previous work at the Smithsonian, I was required to have an ID card on me at all times, which also acted as a key to the shared housing I lived in. They forced me to use my deadname, so at all times I was at risk of being outed. I ask that my fellow queer biologists stay safe, and may we find prosperity. I hope my process has been useful. One of the greatest advantages of a career in field ecology is the opportunities it creates to live and work in incredible places. I have counted aphids in agricultural fields in Denmark, collected Daphnia in arctic lakes in Norway, surveyed seaweeds on California's Channel Islands, and even tracked snail mucus trails in Israel's Negev Desert. However, as a queer person, chasing these opportunities can often come with an added layer of anxiety and risk. For me, the trade-off between career and safety really came into view when I received an offer for a postdoctoral position at the University of Alabama (UA). The position at UA was ideal in almost every way: (1) the principal investigator (PI) had a great reputation, (2) the projects would expand my skill set in wetland ecosystem ecology and restoration science, (3) the collaborations would expand my network in the Gulf region, and (4) the position would allow me considerable freedom to build my own research program with undergraduate students. However, Alabama is one of the worst states in the United States for sexual and gender identity equality. In fact, Alabama's hostility toward the LGBT+ community almost deterred me from taking the position at UA, but I can honestly say I am happy that it did not! I ended up staying in my postdoctoral position at UA for over 2 years, until I got my first faculty position. While Alabama never changed, and I struggled to access medical care, I also found some of the most incredible allies there. My PI was a champion of equity and inclusion and was an outspoken supporter of LGBT+ initiatives on campus. She also took the time to learn from my experience and understand my perspective as a queer early career academic. My labmates, including the lab's PhD student Jake Dybiec, were also thoughtful and caring allies. When we were out doing fieldwork in rural Alabama and Mississippi, Jake would stand outside the bathroom until I was done and remain close when we encountered strangers to ensure that I was safe. These simple acts are still some of the greatest forms of allyship that I have experienced in my career as a field ecologist. I would never encourage LGBT+ folks to jeopardize their safety, but I do encourage LGBT+ folks to keep an open mind, because sometimes you will find the most supportive people in the places you would never expect. I would like to dedicate this work to my friend, colleague, and partner in mud Dr. Jake Dybiec, who passed away in July 2023 while doing the field work that he loved. I wish that every queer human could have an ally half as loving and supportive as he was. In recent decades, queer has been used as a verb to name the way we can disrupt and destabilize systems of power, most often, cis-heteronormativity. However, we could also use queer to interrogate our understanding of stable identities. Recently—particularly in an era of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) initiatives at the university/college level—there has been newfound rigidity in identity politics. Many disciplines, but especially STEM fields, are making moves to increase the inclusion of diverse voices and experiences. While this is clearly an important and worthwhile endeavor, it has led to a narrow and rigid understanding of DEI and identities. For queer students, researchers, and teachers, who find their sense of self is defined by queer fluidity, this poses a problem. Traditional queer political rhetoric suggests that LGBTQ+ people were "born this way" as a justification for our access to rights. While queerness is an innate sense of self that clearly justifies access to rights, this has pigeonholed the community and individuals within fixed, constructed identities. Navigating STEM, and especially field ecology, when you are navigating your own evolving queerness can be challenging. This is mainly due to fixed notions of DEI restricting people from claiming different identities (some of which are potentially more or less marginalized in STEM) and gaining access to corresponding support. As a queer field ecologist, I have identified in many different queer ways, but my inclusion in the discipline has been limited due to the development of fixed mindsets around queer identities in field ecology. Many people may take for granted that they will have ready access to a bathroom when they are at their place of work, but to quote a song from the Broadway musical Urinetown, "It's a privilege to pee." Public bathroom access strongly impacts a person's ability to exist in the world and be gainfully employed. From segregated bathrooms impacting the work of the women scientists whose stories were fictionalized in Hidden Figures, to disability activists whose work led to the adoption of the Americans with Disabilities Act in 1990, bathroom access has always been an equity issue for many marginalized groups. Since that data were collected, the situation has worsened for trans bathroom access with the rise in so-called "bathroom" bills that seek to prevent transgender people from using a bathroom corresponding to their gender. According to the Movement Advancement Project, as of January 22, 2025, 18 states have enacted laws or policies that impact transgender people's access to bathrooms or facilities based on their gender identity. Many of these ban transgender people from using bathrooms and facilities consistent with their gender identity in government-owned buildings and spaces and/or K-12 schools. Additionally, two states—Florida and Utah—make it a criminal offense for a trans person to use a bathroom corresponding to their gender identity. For safety reasons, many trans people choose to be discreet about their gender identity and conform to binary gender norms while traveling and working in unfamiliar or potentially hostile locations they may visit in the course of doing field research. This can be challenging and exhausting. However, with field crew mutual agreements of courtesy and respect for privacy, doing field research in remote natural areas without access to bathrooms can actually be less stressful for trans people than everyday bathroom use. This is because if everyone, men and women, has the same practice of using the restroom behind some bushes or another privacy shield, it is less gendered than most public bathrooms, and a trans person doesn't have to navigate scrutiny of their gender presentation to complete a basic and necessary bodily function. University campus environments can actually present more challenges to trans people's access to bathrooms than some fieldwork settings. Many buildings still do not include gender-neutral bathrooms, which are safer and more accessible for trans and gender nonconforming people. Even if gender-neutral bathrooms are included in newer buildings, they are often single-use and double as ADA (Americans with Disabilities Act) compliant wheelchair-accessible bathrooms. With limited numbers of these accessible bathrooms, some trans people who are not disabled, or who have an invisible disability, can feel reticent to use them, fearing they may be perceived as delaying access for disabled people, even though it could be a safer option for them than gendered multi-stall alternatives. Here are some best practices for making bathrooms more accessible for trans scientists in the field and at their home institutions. In the context of home institutions, allies can and should advocate for the conversion of gendered bathrooms to gender-neutral bathrooms. In general, it is easiest to start by converting single-stall bathrooms to gender-neutral ones. Having multi-stall gender-neutral bathrooms significantly increases bathroom access for trans people, but can be challenging in some states due to legislation regulating the physical infrastructure of gender-neutral multi-use bathrooms (e.g., requiring floor-to-ceiling walls between stalls). Where differential infrastructure exists and cannot be renovated, changing signage can still make a difference. If local laws permit, you can change signage from gendered/sexed language (e.g., men's and women's restroom, male and female toilets) to language that describes the facilities contained (e.g., restroom with urinals and stalls, restroom with changing table). Twenty-five years ago, in a paper titled "Are There General Laws in Ecology?", John Lawton published a provocative idea: "Community ecology is a mess… the time has come to move on" (Lawton 1999). Lawton presented the idea that due to the contingencies and idiosyncratic nature of community ecology studies, often results hold true only to the specific communities from which the results came, and thus we should instead focus research efforts on other ecological subfields that can provide more useful generalizations. However, in the decades since, each year has seen increases in the number of publications about community ecology, suggesting a refusal by ecologists to abandon the field in spite of the complexity. I propose that a potential reason community ecology has thrived all of these years could be because of the messiness, complexity, and contingencies involved, which provide unlimited opportunities for exploration. Despite a lack of universal laws, community ecology remains useful for interrogating the endless unknowns surrounding the ways organisms interact with each other and their environment. For me, navigating the mess that is community ecology empowered me to explore my gender identity. Just like in ecology, there are no universal laws of gender. While there are commonalities that allow us to identify certain themes, each individual's experience with gender can be completely different. Non-binary is an umbrella term that falls under the broader identity of transgender. It encompasses any gender that exists outside of the binary of man or woman. However, there are endless identities that are described by the term. The boundaries between these identities are not always well defined, and they can shift between individuals and over time. As ecologists, our comfort with complexity prepares us to be strong allies to the trans community. All the time, we recognize the importance of grappling with nuance and having an imperfect understanding of our systems, yet are able to continuously advocate for the protection of the communities we study. Similarly, we can fight to protect free gender expression and access to gender-affirming medical care, even though as an ally, you may not have a comprehensive understanding of all the nuances of gender identity. To end my section, I want to highlight a quote by Gwendolyn Ann Smith, the founder of Trans Day of Remembrance. "The notion of classifying things and then claiming that only this or that is a proper version of something is a distinctly human construct, full of arrogance and hubris" (Bornstein and Bergman 2010). Our natural world is messy and beautiful and endlessly fascinating, just like the incredible variations in gender that span the collective human experience. Embracing the mess means getting comfortable with the differences that make life exciting and still doing the work to understand and fight for the things that matter. As a transgender undergraduate student with involvement in a variety of fieldwork projects, I have had both positive and negative experiences with research mentors in regard to my gender identity. As a student, I feel uniquely qualified to describe the mentorship styles that have and have not worked for me as a transgender individual. I hope that sharing my personal experience can help spark conversations about supporting TGnC mentees and colleagues in field research experiences. A particularly traumatizing experience occurred when I conducted research in Uganda. I had asked the supervising faculty member directly about my gender identity and safety and was told that as long as I did not have to get undressed or go to the hospital, I would be fine. Unfortunately, I did end up having to go to the hospital for injury treatment after being attacked by a group of monkeys (Hartmann 2025), and it became a very real possibility that my identity would be revealed in a country where it is illegal to be trans. Luckily, I ended up okay. However, with a better understanding of the risks I would face, I could have been better prepared for this situation, or it could have been avoided entirely. There was no plan in place for how to handle a serious injury, let alone how to handle this situation as a trans person. I clearly had not been prepared for how risky it would be to do physically dangerous work in a place where my identity was punishable by death (Equaldex). What was supposed to be a transformative field experience that I had heard all the cool ecologists talk about turned into a traumatizing experience that made me lose my drive to continue in field-based research because of legitimate fear for my safety. There is a big push to diversify the field of ecology, but not having the safety and support networks in place to protect TGnC people will lead to negative experiences that further deter people from the field. Having a plan and not needing it is significantly better than not having a plan and trying to find solutions on the fly. TGnC individuals may be present but silent. You may not know that you have a TGnC student or lab mate. Mentors, ask yourself, "What's the worst-case scenario for this person on my team?" and then plan for it! So what can you do to improve field experiences for trans students or teammates? What can be learned from my negative experience? I suggest these four things: (1) honoring privacy, (2) preparing for differing attitudes and laws, (3) creating inclusive social spaces, and (4) preparing for physical risks. First, honoring privacy is essential for creating a comfortable environment. A lack of privacy can lead to significant discomfort, particularly in shared spaces for anyone, but this is especially true for TGnC individuals. Having the option of private housing and private bathrooms can be pivotal. At the very least, gender-neutral housing, or allowing people to choose how they wish to be assigned in housing, will decrease this barrier. Similarly, gender-neutral bathrooms can be transformative, promoting inclusivity and increasing comfort for TGnC individuals. Second, you must understand, and adequately describe to your team the dominant cultural attitudes for the area in which research will be conducted. Think about laws, culture and social beliefs. Will a TGnC person be safe? If their identity is discovered, what are the repercussions? What measures can you take to protect them? Are there alternatives to field work in this context? Be ready to say "I have concerns that this area may not be entirely safe, so here are the safe alternatives that we will do instead." Third, inclusive social spaces are vital in any context, but it is especially important when you are spending significant amounts of time doing strenuous tasks with a small group of people. The simplest thing you can do is introduce yourself with your pronouns. Something that seems so simple is actually an indicator that you are an ally and opens the door for others to share their own pronouns. Make your team a safe space. Also, be sure to respect chosen names. Finally, it is important to conduct adequate risk assessments to avoid the need for medical attention for TGnC people. Fieldwork is inherently risky due to its physical nature, so how can you prevent accidents or prepare for them? Educate yourself on the possible physical risks associated with being TGnC. Binding or tucking can be very dangerous in extreme heat and when very physically active. Safe and clean places to administer medications are also important. These are just some of the things you should think about when considering TGnC people in your field research and safety plans. Not all solutions work for every situation, but you should think about what is possible and communicate what is not. The experiences shared here underscore the significant barriers that TGnC scientists face in field ecology. Despite navigating these barriers, TGnC scientists demonstrate remarkable resilience in finding joy and purpose in their work. However, resilience should not be a requirement for inclusion. Field ecology thrives on understanding and embracing complexity. The same principles should guide our approach to supporting TGnC ecologists. Meaningful change demands that institutions, supervisors, and colleagues step up to create safer, more inclusive spaces. This includes proactive measures such as fostering inclusive policies, providing practical support, and centering the voices of TGnC individuals in these conversations. We would like to thank the members of the Trans and Gender-nonconforming Field Alliance for their support in doing this advocacy work, which is more important now than ever. We would like to thank Kyle Shanebeck and Vaughn Shirey for their contributions to the session. Additionally, we thank Jake Dybeic and allies like him for supporting TGnC colleagues and creating inclusive spaces in field ecology.