
Q Chat Space - A Community for LGBTQ+ Teens
Are you a youth looking for the Q Chat Space online discussions? Go to www.qchatspace.org.
Are you a youth serving professional wanting to know more about Q Chat Space? Read on. You are in the right place.
Download the Q Chat Space promotion kit here...
What is Q Chat Space?
Q Chat Space provides live, chat-based, professionally facilitated, online support and discussion groups for LGBTQ+ teens 13-19.
Check out this video to see what joining a group is like for teens.
What are youth participants saying?
"Thank you again! And I am so excited myself too! I never really got to go physically to [my local LGBTQ+ center] because of family reasons. But now that I have this opportunity. I won't feel as lonely!"
"A lot of people say that talking online is really impersonal and stuff but I feel so much love radiating from my computer screen."
"It is just hard to find friends, luckily I have this to talk to people and have a great time just like real life."
"I've just been logging on [to Q Chat Space] for the past few weeks. I do school online, so i don't get to meet a lot of lgbtq+ kids."
What organizations are involved in Q Chat Space?
Q Chat Space was developed by CenterLink in partnership with Planned Parenthood Federation of America and PFLAG National and in collaboration with CenterLink member centers. It is a resource for all LGBTQ+ centers and other organizations serving LGBTQ+ youth to better serve youth who cannot access services in person.
Why Q Chat Space?
LGBTQ+ youth need safe opportunities to chat with others like them within a structure that encourages compassionate interactions and discourages bullying and harassment. They don’t like being seen as always in crisis. However, they face many obstacles to accessing in-person resources, from a lack of transportation to an understandable hesitancy to attend face-to-face groups. A young teen often has no practical way to get to a LGBTQ+ community center, when it’s potentially a hundred miles away (or more). Q Chat Space brings a core service of an LGBTQ+ community center, a support group, directly to the teen’s digital device.
A study assessing the utility, feasibility, and acceptability of Q Chat Space found that the program "offers promising strategies to address the risk factors implicated in LGBTQ youth health and wellbeing."
Who is Q Chat Space for?
LGBTQ+ and questioning teens, 13-19 years old.
Who facilitates discussions?
Currently experienced staff at LGBTQ+ centers facilitate discussions on behalf of all LGBTQ+ centers.
Spanish language chats are facilitated by staff at:
- LGBTQ Center Orange County (Santa Ana, CA)
English language chats are facilitated by staff at:
- Center on Halsted (Chicago, IL)
- Hetrick-Martin Institute (New York, NY)
- Hugh Lane Wellness Foundation (Pittsburgh, PA)
- LGBTQ Center Orange County (Santa Ana, CA)
- SMYAL (Washington, DC)
- Time Out Youth (Charlotte, NC)
How do you make sure it is a safe and secure space?
Like in-person spaces, there is always an adult facilitator present to moderate conversation. If needed, facilitators are able to mute and block participants and administrators are able to remove people from the chat platform completely as well. Participants can be anonymous, only sharing a username and data is encrypted.
I work with youth. How can I let them know about Q Chat Space?
- Refer them to www.qchatspace.org
- Download social media graphics, web banners, and other promotion materials below...
Q Chat Space Promotion Kit
Download the full kit or individual items. The complete kit contains:
- Q Chat Space logo
- Logo color/font/specs
- Template for a dedicated page or section of your website (available to CenterLink members only)
- Banners for your website
- Social media graphics
- Spanish website content
- Social media content (please tag #qchatspace)
- Link to YouTube video orienting youth to Q Chat Space discussion groups
- Small color poster (8.5x11) to print and hang or distribute in your community
- Wallet cards to distribute in your community
- Postcards you can print to send to professionals who serve youth in your community
- Template email/letter you can send to youth-serving professionals in your community
- Template email/letter you can send to youth-serving professionals in Spanish and English
- Social media captions in Spanish and English
- Social Media graphics with captions and text in Spanish
- Q Chat Space Wallet Card in Spanish
- Q Chat Space Poster in Spanish
NOTE: Logo Specifications
Logotype font: Roboto Slab Bold (by Google)
Logotype color: #3B297C (rgb: 59,41,124)
Circle symbol color: #D5CAFF (rgb: 213,202,255)
Triangle symbol color: #FBFDA6 (rgb: 251,253,166)