Around 50 people dressed in black gathered at the Parks Library at Iowa State University in Ames, Iowa, this past Wednesday for a funeral for the college’s Center for LGBTQIA+ Student Success.

Founded in 1992, the Center, which occupies part of the fourth floor of the Iowa State Memorial Union, was a safe space for queer and trans students at Iowa State for decades until a state law targeting diversity initiatives in higher education – S.F. 2435 – was passed last year.

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“It was a space that celebrated queer joy and accomplishment, academically and personally,” student Silvera Dudenhoefer said at the funeral, according to the Ames Tribune. “Above all, it was a clear mark that LGBTQIA+ students mattered to this school.”

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“This university is failing in its moral responsibility,” state Sen. Herman Quirmbach (D) said at the event. “The members of the Board of Regents are failing. And the legislature? Don’t get me started.”

Last spring, the state legislature passed S.F. 2435, which the Des Moines Register branded as the “most extreme” anti-DEI measure passed by any state. It bans not only DEI offices at universities but also bans the administration from expressing any “widely contested opinion” on a long list of topics, including group marginalization, “transgender ideology,” “heteronormativity,” “neo-pronouns,” and “gender theory,” as well as a list of topics related to feminism and anti-racism. It also banned “any related formulation of these concepts.”

The ban includes any trainings, programs, or activities a university could host that address any of these topics, which includes the Center for LGBTQIA+ Student Success. The Center is still open, and S.F. 2435 goes into effect on July 1, 2025. It gives a December 31 deadline to eliminate all programs like the Center.

ISU Students Against SF 2435 Coalition published a mock obituary and held the funeral, saying that the Center was ended “with the assistance of Iowa State University.”

“This marks a great loss for the community, and we encourage those impacted to join us and find community in these trying times,” the obituary states.

“When attacks like this hurt my friends, my family, my coworkers, and my peers, it hurts me, and that’s not okay,” graduate student Amanda Thomas said at the event. “Allies are here, even if you can’t see them.”

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