ACTIVIST EDITOR-Traci Baim, JO'84, has bridged two passions into one successful career.

Drake used to have a pornography festival every year while I was there," says Traci Baim, JO'84. "I decided to organize an erotic film festival as sort of a counterpoint because they weren't providing any discussion or feedback about the films they screened."

"So we held our erotic film festival," says Baim, then a journalism student and proponent of free speech, "which included gay and lesbian erotic films as well as interracial films, in the same building on the same weekend as the pornography festival and we got a lot of overflow audience."

"I never protested the pornography film festival, and the administration let me do my film fest despite some not-very-positive press in The Des Moines Register."

As an openly gay student at Drake in the early 1980s-with no official gay and lesbian student organization on campus-Baim often found herself in the middle of controversy.

"In many ways, I was ostracized because I was openly gay and an ardent feminist, but I created my own community," Baim relates.

Little did Baim know she had only begun what would become a career of organizing for and reporting about the gay and lesbian community.

After graduating from Drake in 1984, Baim heard about a job opening at Chicago's gay lifestyle newspaper. Within a year, she became its managing editor. In 1987, Baim launched Outlines, a gay and lesbian alternative lifestyles newspaper that battled The Windy City Times for readership. In the late 1990s, the rivaling papers merged. Almost 20 years later, Baim is publisher and managing editor of The Windy City Times, Chicago's primary gay and lesbian weekly newspaper with a circulation of 20,000. Baim resides as co-owner and board president of Windy City Media, the publication's parent company.

Serving diverse communities
"We do two monthly publications in addition to the weekly," says Baim, "Blacklines and En La Vida -one covers African-American gay and lesbian issues, the other Hispanic. They were started seven years ago and came out of those communities. Chicago is very racially divided and so is the gay movement. This was an opportunity to cover those communities in depth."

Before launching the publications, Baim instigated a series of public forums with both African-American and Hispanic communities. As a majority white-owned company, Baim didn't want to be seen as trying to speak for either community. Instead, Windy City Media was able to offer resources and an opportunity for Black and Hispanic writers and photographers to cover issues in their community. "We have had great support from the community," Baim continues, "We're a free forum open to criticism as long as there is a chance for rebuttal."

Although these numerous publications would keep most people busy, Baim sees more opportunity to expand gay and lesbian outreach in Chicago. Windy City Media has recently begun the Windy City Radio Program, a Sunday night call-in radio program, on the same FM station where Chicago listeners can hear shock-jock Howard Stern during the week. "We reach into four states and the program catches people in the suburbs who can't otherwise get information safely. We're providing important information to people who otherwise have no access to it," Baim proudly notes.

Drake's impact: following her heart and her head
Baim is delighted at the amount of awareness and involvement she has been able to facilitate as a result of her combined commitment to the gay and lesbian community and her love of journalism. "I come from a journalism family. My father was a photographer, my stepfather worked at The Chicago Tribune, and my mother also worked there in the 1960s."

Baim pauses and reflects on her achievements, "At Drake, Professor Woodward allowed me to push the boundaries of what it meant to be a journalist. He helped me discover that there are other ways of being a journalist. It was great for me because I was seriously wondering whether I could go into journalism as an openly gay person. I knew I couldn't work at The Tribune or something. That just wasn't for me."

Baim also found support in unexpected areas. "I attempted suicide in my sophomore year at Drake," Baim confides. "My poetry professor at the time had us write journals in class and I wrote about my suicide attempt. When he gave the journal back to me, he had written, 'you don't need to compromise who you are to be in this world.' This professor was a great role model for me and very courageous."

When Baim reflects on her good fortune to work in an area that means so much to her on a personal level, she smiles and says, "I started writing when I was 10 and now as I'm about to turn 40, I still marvel that I get to work in journalism. I just want to tell Drake's current journalism students that it takes creativity to keep doing what you love-and there are things I don't like doing, like the accounting work-but I get to write and cover my community. I hope that other journalism students find as much joy with their degree as I have."

Lisa Gildehaus, JO'93, is an independent filmmaker and writer.

It was finally Anne Witowski's turn to shoot for her education dream. She had been there for her three daughters as they pursued college educations and began their careers. Her husband, Bob, retired two years ago after a 36-year career of teaching and coaching.

So three years ago, Witowski, at age 57, resumed her pursuit of a college degree. It took determination as she battled self-doubt and other obstacles. But last spring, at age 61, Witowski walked proudly across the stage of Drake's Knapp Center to receive her bachelor of science degree in rehabilitation services.

Witowski's opportunity to pursue her education came through her work as program employment coordinator with Elderbridge Agency on Aging. She works part-time at the Iowa Workforce Development Center, where she learned about a National Rehabilitation Institute grant that would help with education costs in that field.

Witowski initially took classes on weekends in Atlantic before switching full time to the Drake campus in Des Moines.
She might not have been a Rhoades Scholar, but she was definitely a "roads scholar." Some days, she made the 90-minute commute on her own. Other days, Bob or friends rode along with her.

Along with hitting the road, Witowski had to discipline herself to hit the books again. At first, she says, "It was hard to concentrate on study when you knew you wanted to go do something else. I didn't want to miss anything social."
She had to put away the golf clubs. The laundry pile grew mountainous. There were family matters needing attention. "There were just times I couldn't do everything. There were times I wanted to quit," she says.

But she stuck with it, and as her goal came within sight, her resolve and focus strengthened. One of her biggest classroom challenges was mastering the computer technology that was needed throughout her studies.

"I had to learn how to access classes over the Internet, do research, take tests from the Drake Web site and interact with classmates for such things as team workshops. This was all a new thing to me, but I found the young people were very helpful."

The commutes to Drake and the classroom time were beneficial, she says, "because you're sharing with other students. That's part of the learning experience. They (classmates) have so much to offer from their own experiences that you can learn from."

Witowski's schedule included two or three classes each semester, as well as summer courses. She took classes beyond her rehabilitation services major, such as Chinese culture, world geography, and management and business. She also participated in two internships and studied Native American culture in Albuquerque, NM, as part of a Drake travel seminar.

She's demonstrated that learning can be a lifelong pursuit, says husband Bob of his wife's ambition. "I admire her," he says. "I'm not sure I could go to school right now and achieve what she's been able to achieve. You set a lofty goal and go after it. It takes quite a bit of commitment to reach that goal, and when you reach it, that's very satisfying not only for the person but for all the people around her."

Republished with the permission of the Carroll, IA, Daily Times Herald. Larry Devine is a staff writer for Daily Times Herald.

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