Trans Athletes and the Future of Sports

For the past several years—and during the summer Olympics—the issue of trans athletes’ participation in sports has never been far from the headlines. State legislatures, sports’ governing bodies, celebrities, and political leaders have all gotten involved—particularly when the topic is about who can compete in girls’ and women’s sports.  

This panel will discuss the current issues about trans athletes participating in sports and what the future of sports could be when everyone gets to compete.

This panel will be live-streamed and viewers will be able to text questions for the panel. Visit this link to access the livestream. Instructions for texting questions will be provided here a few days before the event.

Only ISU students with a valid ISU ID will be admitted to this event. Seating is limited to 200 and will be first-come, first seated.

Extra Credit Attendance

• Students who attend in person need to have their student ID scanned when they leave.
• Students who watch the live stream: At the end of the event, a message will be displayed with the following instructions and info.
  • Within 15 minutes of the panel ending, email the following info to lectures@iastate.edu
    • Subject line: Trans athlete panel extra credit
    • Your name
    • Your 9-digit student ID number (the middle set of numbers on your ID)
    • The code word on the screen; it will say "Codeword: [word here]"

Panelists

Keenan Crow is the director of Policy and Advocacy at One Iowa, a statewide LGBTQ advocacy organization. Keenan joined the organization after a history of political and non-profit involvement with organizations such as Cedar Valley Citizens for Undoing Racism. As One Iowa’s staff lobbyist and spokesperson on policy issues, they are on the front lines of the fight for LGBTQ equality in the state of Iowa. Additionally, Keenan has worked to train a diverse number of organizations and institutions around LGBTQ issues including K-16 educators, local and federal agencies, businesses, and health care providers. In 2019 they became the first non-binary person to moderate a presidential forum. They are a recipient of the 2023 Interfaith Alliance of Iowa partner award and the 2023 Iowa Environmental Council’s Impact Through Advocacy Award.

Dr. Christina Roberts is a Professor of Pediatrics working at the Mount Sinai Adolescent Health Center in New York City. Prior to starting at Mount Sinai, she served on active duty with the United States Navy from 1995 to 2018 and worked as the Program Director of the Adolescent Medicine Fellowship at Children’s Mercy, Kansas City, from 2018 to 2023. Her clinical involvement in Gender Medicine began in June 2016 when the military first allowed active duty service members and their families to obtain gender-affirming medical care in the military healthcare system. While in the Navy, she helped establish the administrative guidelines for delivering gender-affirming care to active duty service members in the Air Force and provided gender-affirming medical care for active duty service members and their family members. At Children’s Mercy, she was a member of the Gender Pathway Services clinic, providing gender-affirming care to transgender and gender-diverse individuals ages 12 to 21. Currently, she is also part of the Mount Sinai Center for Transgender Medicine and Surgery providing gender-affirming medical care to adolescents and young adults ages 11 to 26.

Lia Thomas is a transgender woman, an athlete, and an advocate. She graduated from the University of Pennsylvania in 2022 where she competed as an openly transgender swimmer and became the first trans athlete to win an NCAA D1 Championship. She received significant media attention for her competition on the women’s team and has spoken about her experiences and of the importance of inclusion in athletics. In addition to her NCAA awards, she has been named one of the 100 most Influential Philadelphians in 2022 and The Trustee’s Council of Penn Women’s 2022 Athletic Achievement Award.

Dr. Kelly L. Winfrey became director of the Women’s and Gender Studies Program in August 2022. She is also an associate professor and director of Graduate Education in the Greenlee School of Journalism and Communication. Her research focuses on gender and political campaign communication. She published Understanding How Women Vote: Gender Identity and Political Choices (Praeger) in 2018, and she has published journal articles and book chapters on gender group identification voters, the effects of gender in presidential and U.S. Senate campaigns, perceptions of candidate image by debate viewers, online self-presentation strategies of political candidates, media coverage of women candidates, and the content and effects of presidential campaign television ads. Winfrey teaches classes on political campaigns, gender and leadership, public relations, and research methods. She also regularly mentors undergraduate and graduate students interested in researching gender and politics. 

This event is part of a Women’s and Gender Studies Lecture Series funded by the Mellon Foundation’s Affirming Multivocal Humanities Grant, which was awarded to Dr. Winfrey and the WGS program in the fall of 2023.