The Harvard Gay and Lesbian Caucus (HGLC) is an American non-profit organization

Non-profit organization

Nonprofit organization is neither a legal nor technical definition but generally refers to an organization that uses surplus revenues to achieve its goals, rather than distributing them as profit or dividends...

 of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender

LGBT

LGBT is an initialism that collectively refers to "lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender" people. In use since the 1990s, the term "LGBT" is an adaptation of the initialism "LGB", which itself started replacing the phrase "gay community" beginning in the mid-to-late 1980s, which many within the...

 (LGBT) Harvard University

Harvard University

Harvard University is a private Ivy League university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States, established in 1636 by the Massachusetts legislature. Harvard is the oldest institution of higher learning in the United States and the first corporation chartered in the country...

 and Radcliffe College

Radcliffe College

Radcliffe College was a women's liberal arts college in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and was the coordinate college for Harvard University. It was also one of the Seven Sisters colleges. Radcliffe College conferred joint Harvard-Radcliffe diplomas beginning in 1963 and a formal merger agreement with...

 alumni/ae, faculty, staff and students. In 2009 members and supporters of the HGLC funded an LGBT studies

Queer studies

Queer studies is the critical theory based study of issues relating to sexual orientation and gender identity usually focusing on lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex people and cultures. Universities have also labeled this area of analysis Sexual Diversity Studies, Sexualities...

 endowed professorship at Harvard, believed to be the first of its kind in the United States.

Formed in 1984 to pressure Harvard University to include sexual orientation

Sexual orientation

Sexual orientation describes a pattern of emotional, romantic, or sexual attractions to the opposite sex, the same sex, both, or neither, and the genders that accompany them. By the convention of organized researchers, these attractions are subsumed under heterosexuality, homosexuality,...

 in its non-discrimination policy, the HGLC's influence resulted in the President and Fellows of Harvard College

Harvard College

Harvard College, in Cambridge, Massachusetts, is one of two schools within Harvard University granting undergraduate degrees...

's 1985 creation of a new University-wide anti-discrimination policy that included discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation. After lobbying from the HGLC, in 1993 Harvard began to offer benefits to the same-sex partners of its employees.

The HGLC notes its current purposes to include advocating "a non-discriminatory and diverse academic, living and working environment at Harvard" and maintaining and expanding a network of LGBT alumni/ae. The organization also awards an annual HGLC Public Service Fellowship, and honors Harvard affiliates for contributions to the LGBT community.

In June 2009, Harvard announced that it will establish an endowed chair in LGBT studies called the F. O. Matthiessen

F. O. Matthiessen

Francis Otto Matthiessen was an educator, scholar and literary critic influential in the fields of American literature and American studies.-Scholarly work:...

 Visiting Professorship of Gender and Sexuality, funded by a $1.5 million gift from the members and supporters of the Harvard Gay & Lesbian Caucus. Believing the post to be "the first professorship of its kind in the country," Harvard President Drew Gilpin Faust

Drew Gilpin Faust

Catherine Drew Gilpin Faust is an American historian, college administrator, and the president of Harvard University. Faust is the first woman to serve as Harvard's president and the university's 28th president overall. Faust is the fifth woman to serve as president of an Ivy League university, and...

called it “an important milestone.”