Queer people exist everywhere
QSA Founder and Event Director, Steve Keith, shares the reasons he resisted the temptation to launch the awards in London, and explains why QSA2024 will see the awards taking their first step on what will become a national tour of the UK in years to come.
(Excerpt from a recent interview with Conference News)
“In 2021, I founded the UK’s first annual student celebration – The Queer Student Awards (QSAs) – focused on celebrating the talented young LGBTQ+ people who are proudly leading in their lives, and the communities around them. The awards also recognise the work that individual allies, schools, colleges, universities and employers are doing to create inclusive spaces that support young LGBTQ+ people, many of whom worry about whether sharing their sexuality and gender identity will act as a barrier to their future success in the career of their choice. The awards are judged by a panel of student recruitment industry experts, queer influencers and young LGBTQ+ people from schools, colleges and universities.
When I launched the QSAs, they took place on Zoom due to the ongoing restrictions of the pandemic. For the last two years, they have been hosted by venues in Manchester – Whitworth Locke and Victoria Warehouse. In 2024 they will be taking place in Birmingham [at The Birmingham Town Hall].
I intentionally chose not to host the event in London because I believe there are far too many events in general that take place in London. I am a very passionate Northerner, and feel very strongly that areas outside of London are heavily neglected when it comes to hosting events, in particular within student recruitment where most awards and events celebrating students and employers take place in the capital. I’ve often felt that some event organisers are distracted by the perceived prestige of hosting their event in the capital – I understand having lived there for 14 years that it is a wonderful city, but it isn’t the only place in the U.K. that can and should be hosting events. You can choose a different focal point and still host a memorable event for your guests.
I chose Manchester to bring the event to life away from Zoom, once Covid restrictions were lifted because it’s the nearest city to where I‘m currently based in the Lake District. That made it much easier for me to visit potential venues and to host on the day. However, I also chose Manchester because it has a rich history of support for the LGBTQ+ community and a large vibrant scene on Canal Street. Since first hosting there in 2022, the results of the latest UK census which collected information on sexuality and gender identity for the first time have been shared, clearly showing the extent to which the LGBTQ+ community is present across the UK. With that in mind from this point forward I’ve decided to host the awards in a different city each year so that we can collaborate with local LGBTQ+ communities to ensure we are representing Queer people on a local and national scale.
London has some fantastic venues but in all honesty, the ones that I have visited in Manchester and Birmingham over the last couple of years have had a lot more personality and wow factor.
In my experience, a lot of awards hosted in London end up in the same hotels and it can get incredibly repetitive. You go along knowing what to expect (or not expect) every time – who wants their event to be predictable or to serve up yet another dry chicken breast wrapped in bacon?
By choosing a different city and venue each year for the QSAs I plan to make the event something exciting in the student recruitment calendar that students, employers and educators look forward to because they never quite know what to expect.”
FIRST STOP…BIRMINGHAM!
After two years of hosting the QSAs in Manchester, in 2024 we begin our national tour of the UK…first stop Birmingham Town Hall.
This purpose built iconic concert hall has hosted many ‘moments of revolution and liberation’ including the anti-slavery meetings of the 1830s, a platform for the several addresses of social reformer, MP and Birmingham mayor Joseph Chamberlain and as war clouds loomed, Emmeline Pankhurst used Town Hall as a platform to encourage men to join up. By 1946, the Town Hall was hosting International Women’s Day celebrations to unite women as wives, mothers, workers, citizens.
Read the original full Conference News article here.
