On Saturday, September 20th, The Pride Center of Montclair, in partnership with Garden State Equality, will host a comprehensive and informative event for LGBTQ parents and those hoping to become parents, as well as reproductive and fertility practitioners.
Bringing together parents, prospective parents, and professionals, this event will address the unique concerns, challenges and opportunities that LGBTQ parents, families and couples may face, such as adoption, fostering, surrogacy, IVF and fertility treatments, sperm donations, and trans parentage.
The event will be structured around panel discussions and information sessions and will also include a resource fair with LGBTQ community organizations and networking opportunities, as well as child care. Participants can expect to leave feeling educated, empowered, celebrated and uplifted.
Marie Cottrell, Executive Director of The Pride Center of Montclair said of the event:
“Every family deserves a clear, affirming roadmap to parenthood—and this summit is where that roadmap begins for the LGBTQ+ community. This summit turns questions into choices, and choices into families. In partnership with Garden State Equality, we are bringing the first-of-its-kind Queer Parentage Summit to our community, turning uncertainty into possibilities. Too many LGBTQ+ people have been told that their path to parenthood is confusing or out of reach. By putting trusted legal, medical, and social-service experts in one room—and spotlighting adoption and fostering, surrogacy, IVF/IUI, donor conception, and the journeys of trans and nonbinary parents—we’re offering clear, affirming roadmaps and real connections. Every couple, every family, deserves both information and welcoming; this summit is our invitation to dream, to plan, and to know you chose the right path for you to build your family.”
Lauren Albrecht, Senior Director of Advocacy at Garden State Equality, “hope(s) that this event will result in community members feeling prepared to take the next step on their journey towards being parents. It’s a special and personal journey that LGBTQ people are often left out of, for so many reasons, and that’s why we wanted to join The Pride Center of Montclair in this new and innovative way of serving our community.”
Attendees can register for no cost here.