Arts & Entertainment

Out & Equal Conference comes to Baltimore

LGBT workplace advocacy group has bevy of events planned

Published

14 years ago

October 18, 2012

Santiago Melli-Huber

Last year’s Out & Equal Conference was held in Dallas. It’s in Baltimore this year. (Photo courtesy Out & Equal)

Many U.S. residents — even in the LGBT world — forget there are 29 states where it’s perfectly legal to fire an employee based solely on his or her sexual orientation.

For those at Out & Equal Workplace Advocates, that’s a major concern.

Issues of workplace equality for gays are again on the table at this year’s Out & Equal Workplace Summit, an annual event that comes this year to Baltimore from Oct. 29-Nov. 1.

The purpose of the Summit, organizers say, is to draw thousands of professionals from across the country and around the world to discuss strategies to create workplace equality. From there, attendees are encouraged to take what they learned and improve the working conditions for LGBT employees of their respective companies.

“The Summit is an opportunity to learn, teach, network and have fun with kindred spirits,” lesbian Selisse Berry, Out & Equal’s founding executive director, said in a prepared statement. “Together, we will move out from Baltimore, creating the ripples that will build respectful and inclusive workplaces around the globe.”

The Summit, which started in 1999, will take place at the Baltimore Convention Center. Registration is available onsite (online registration was available but is now closed). Registration includes a welcome reception, six workshop sessions featuring about120 program options, leadership seminars, a ticket to the Gala Awards Plenary Reception and Dinner with Sister Sledge member Kathy Sledge, and access to the “Night Out!” events on Oct. 31. About 2,600 attended last year’s conference in Dallas.

Onsite non-sponsor rates start at $1,350 for the full conference but day rates, student discounts and other packages are available in different price brackets.

The “Night Out!” event options include a screening of the film “Codebreaker,” based on the tragic life of gay computer scientist Alan Turing, and a Halloween party in Baltimore’s Power Plant Live.

Speakers at the Summit include Judy Shepard, mother of the late Matthew Shepard, and Zach Wahls, whose speech before the Iowa House Judiciary Committee in favor of marriage equality became an internet sensation and who recently spoke at the Democratic National Convention. Beth Brooke, global vice chair of public policy at Ernst & Young, is the keynote speaker. Brooke is also a member of the International Council on Women’s Business Leadership, led by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

The Summit also features the presentation of the “Outie Awards.” Out & Equal gives the awards annually to individuals and corporations who are leaders in promoting workplace equality for the LGBT community around the world. Categories include outstanding work done by both members of the LGBT community as well as allies. Finalists for the corporate award include, among others, Google and Whirlpool.

In addition to looking for an opportunity to bring the conference to the eastern corridor and the progress being done for the LGBT community in downtown Baltimore, Kevin Jones, deputy director of Out & Equal Workplace Advocates, is excited about the Summit’s location, as Maryland is fighting for same-sex marriage rights this November.

While Out & Equal Workplace Advocates works year-round to create safe and equitable environments for LGBT professionals, the Summit is the organization’s most influential event. Jones, who is openly gay, stresses the importance of the event in relation to the function of the organization.

“The Summit is the single largest program that we do and also the source of almost 90 percent of the resources that run Out & Equal and our other programs — training, consulting, regional affiliate activities — throughout the course of the year.”

According to Jones, a major focus of the 2012 Summit includes federal employees, given the Summit’s proximity to Washington. The Summit is recognized as officially approved training for federal employees.

“The other thing I would say that we’re really hoping to focus on is trying to make sure that voices from historically under-represented communities, particularly in the LGBT corporate world, are visible,” Jones says. “We are spending time trying to make the content accessible to local members of the transgender, bisexual and people of color communities.”

Many workshops and leadership seminars throughout the Summit focus on those issues.

Support for the Summit comes from registration fees as well as scores of corporate sponsors, particularly presenting sponsors Hewlett-Packard and IBM.

Out & Equal Workplace Advocates also held their first Global LGBT Workplace Summit in London this past July, which included a keynote speech by openly gay tennis champion Martina Navratilova.

Up Next

Calendar: events through Oct. 25

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FUND LGBTQ JOURNALISM

Theater

Rorschach stages ‘Dragon Play’ in unlikely, raw space

Out sound designer Madeline ‘Mo’ Oslejsek notes ‘sound is my bag’

Published

4 hours ago

April 18, 2026

Patrick Folliard

Madeline 'Mo' Oslejsek (Photo courtesy of Oslejsek)

‘Dragon Play’
Through May 17
Rorschach Theatre
The Stacks @ Buzzard Point
101 V St., S.W.
$50 ($35 for students and seniors)
Rorschachtheatre.org

Celebrated for its site-specific, immersive productions, Rorschach Theatre puts on plays all over town. The unlikely spots have included greenhouses, church vestibules, closed retail spaces (including a vacant downtown big and tall men’s store) and historic locales like Rock Creek Cemetery’s Adams Memorial.

For its current offering “Dragon Play” (through May 17), a tale of love and longing, Rorschach is using a raw space in The Stacks at Buzzard Point, a new mixed-use neighborhood situated where the Anacostia and Potomac rivers meet.

Out sound designer Madeline ‘Mo’ Oslejsek considers all sites – whether traditional theatrical spaces or not – specific, particularly in terms of sound. She says, “Part of my practice is if you’re creating a soundscape for a theatrical production you’re also working with sound that already exists with the space.”

For instance, The Stacks space comes with its own unique qualities. It’s a large cement room that has a different reverberation, an echo.

“Some sounds (a car, dog bark) are planted or they might just happen. What starts as a live sound might be heard again as something recorded.”

Whip smart with a ready laugh, Oslejsek never set out to be a sound designer. She was going to direct. And now, the 2025 Helen Hayes Award nominee for Outstanding Sound Design (“Astro Boy and the God of Comics” at Flying V,) says, “Sound is my bag. Sometimes it seems that I’m the only one in the room thinking about it.”

As an undergrad studying theater at Ohio Wesleyan University, she was first exposed to sound design, but it didn’t make a big impression.

In grad school at Royal Central School of Speech and Drama, University of London, she was interested in direction. But when students were offered a choice of three more specific tracks to choose from (performance, composition, and scenography, which includes sound design), Oslejsek was swayed.

“An introduction to scenography by the department head radically changed the course of my life,” she says.

What struck her most about sound was the subjectivity: “The core of my practice is that sound has no meaning until it’s experienced. All sound is noise. It’s just a pitch, active, or vocalization. It becomes real when you hear it and apply meaning to it. That’s very exciting to me.”

Today, Oslejsek and partner Caitlin Hooper, an actor and intimacy choreographer, are based in Baltimore but work primarily in D.C.

“It feels good to be in a place where art and queerness in art are celebrated. It’s not like that everywhere, and making that kind of work down the street from this White House where that’s not the vibe, is real resistance. That feels really meaningful.”

Also important to Oslejsek (who identifies alternately as queer and lesbian) is “queer as a practice,” a concept suggesting that a queer identity or practice does not seek to replace other identities but to encompass and bridge them.

“I’m queer because I like women, but the work is more about making room for what everyone in the room hears,” she says. “Never do I want to come into a space thinking I have all the answers. That’s no fun.”

As its title might suggest, Jenny Connell Davis’ play directed by Rorschach’s Randy Baker is filled with magic. “Dragon Play,” blurs the past and present; one world bleeds into the next; and, of course, there are dragons. At 80 minutes with no intermission, the play moves in and out of different timelines; increasingly things start to overlap.

And it’s also about the magic of relationships – all kinds. There’s a line where the dragon girl asks a Texas boy what he dreams about and he replies “you, always you.”

Oslejsek, 30, is touched by those words: “In my little gay heart, I cried. It makes me think of my partner. This play is about the idea of people who strike a match in your heart that never really goes away.”

In creating a layered soundscape, she brings her own brand of magic to the production. Her big goal was “not to play with how we think a dragon might sound, but rather with how does the world sound to a dragon.”

Sometimes sound design takes the lead, but in some productions, sound is purposely subtle or secondary, she says. Either way, sound can be monumental in shaping theater.

Calendar

Calendar: April 17-23

LGBTQ events in the days to come

Published

1 day ago

April 17, 2026

Tinashe Chingarande

Friday, April 17

Center Aging Monthly Luncheon With Yoga will be at 12 p.m. at the DC Center for the LGBT Community. Email Mac at [email protected] if you require ASL interpreter assistance, have any dietary restrictions, or questions about this event.

Go Gay DC will host “LGBTQ+ Social in the City” at 7 p.m. at Hotel Zena. This is a chance to relax, make new friends, and enjoy happy hour specials at this classic retro venue. Attendance is free and more details are available on Eventbrite.

Trans and Genderqueer Game Night will be at 7:00p.m. at the DC Center for the LGBT Community. This is a relaxing, laid-back evening of games and fun. All are welcome and there’ll be card and board games on hand. Feel free to bring your own games to share. For more details, visit the DC Center’s website.

Saturday, April 18

Go Gay DC will host “LGBTQ+ Community Brunch” at 11 a.m. at Freddie’s Beach Bar & Restaurant. This fun weekly event brings the DMV area LGBTQ+ community, including allies, together for delicious food and conversation. Attendance is free and more details are available on Eventbrite.

The DC Center for the LGBT Community will host “Sunday Supper on Saturday” at 2 p.m. It’s more than just an event; it’s an opportunity to step away from the busyness of life and invest in something meaningful, and enjoy delicious food, genuine laughter, and conversations that spark connection and inspiration. For more details, visit the Center’s website.

Sunday, April 19

Go Gay DC will host “LGBTQ+ Community Lunch” at 11 a.m. at Federico Ristorante Italiano. This fun weekly event brings the DMV area LGBTQ+ community, including allies, together for delicious food and conversation. Attendance is free and more details are available on Eventbrite.

Monday, April 20

“Center Aging: Monday Coffee Klatch” will be at 10 a.m. on Zoom. This is a social hour for older LGBTQ+ adults. Guests are encouraged to bring a beverage of choice. For more information, contact Adam ([email protected]).

Tuesday, April 21

Center Bi+ Roundtable will be at 7 p.m. on Zoom. This is an opportunity for people to gather in order to discuss issues related to bisexuality or as Bi individuals in a private setting.Visit Facebook or Meetup for more information.

Senior Self Defense Class with Avi Rome will be at 12:30 p.m. This inclusive and beginner-friendly class, led by Instructor Avi Rome, offers a light warm-up, stretching, and instruction in basic techniques, patterns, and striking padded targets. Each session is designed to be adaptable for all ability and mobility levels, creating a welcoming space for everyone to build strength, confidence, and community through martial arts. For more details, visit the DC Center’s website.

Wednesday, April 22

Job Club will be at 6 p.m. on Zoom upon request. This is a weekly job support program to help job entrants and seekers, including the long-term unemployed, improve self-confidence, motivation, resilience and productivity for effective job searches and networking — allowing participants to move away from being merely “applicants” toward being “candidates.” For more information, email [email protected] or visit thedccenter.org/careers.

Asexual and Aromantic Group will meet at 7 p.m. on Zoom. This is a space where people who are questioning this aspect of their identity or those who identify as asexual and/or aromantic can come together, share stories and experiences, and discuss various topics. For more details, email [email protected].

Thursday, April 23

The DC Center’s Fresh Produce Program will be held all day at the DC Center for the LGBT Community. People will be informed on Wednesday at 5:00 pm if they are picked to receive a produce box. No proof of residency or income is required. For more information, email [email protected] or call 202-682-2245.

Virtual Yoga Class will be at 7 p.m. on Zoom. This free weekly class is a combination of yoga, breath work and meditation that allows LGBTQ+ community members to continue their healing journey with somatic and mindfulness practices. For more details, visit the DC Center’s website.

Out & About

Team DC’s annual gala set for this weekend

LGBTQ sports organization to hold annual ‘Night of Champions’

Published

1 day ago

April 17, 2026

Tinashe Chingarande

(Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)

Team DC will host “Night of Champions Gala” on Saturday, April 18 at 6 p.m. at the Georgetown Marriott.

This will be an evening of celebration and inspiration as Team DC honors remarkable individuals and supports the next generation of LGBTQ student-athletes.

There will be opportunities to support Team DC through auctions. The Silent Auction items will offer an array of unique goods and experiences. Additionally, Team DC will feature an exclusive selection of live auction items for those looking to make a significant impact.

This year, Team DC will recognize six outstanding awardees who have made significant contributions to the LGBTQ community and sports: