By Kailyn Gaines, News Correspondent 

In honor of OUTober, Northeastern’s LGBTQA Resource Center hosted its annual pride carnival in Centennial Commons earlier this week.

Students were invited for free cotton candy, popcorn, games and caricature drawings in Centennial Commons, to kick off NU Pride Month.

The carnival hosted several local off-campus organizations as well as on-campus offices such as the Resident Student Association, University Health and Counseling Services and the Office of Prevention and Education. From off-campus, the Greater Boston Parents and Friends of Lesbians and Gays (PFLAG), the Bisexual Resource Center and the LGBTQ Domestic Violence Project were represented.

“OUTober is a great way for us to put ourselves out there to the general community and say ‘Hey, we are here, come learn about the community, come experience this with us, come learn something,’” said Josh Trowbridge, a sophomore mechanical engineering major and president of NU Pride.

Trowbridge became involved with NU Pride his freshman year at the Student Activities Fair, after founding the Gay-Straight Alliance at his high school. Last year, he served on the executive board of NU Pride as the Student Government representative.

“The LGBTQA community here is a very vibrant one, we’re very diverse, we have a lot of people from different walks of life and a lot of different majors and in a lot of different colleges,” Trowbridge said. “I don’t want to say we’re everywhere but we kind of are, we have a lot of diversity within our community. It’s not just a bunch of gay white guys sitting in a room talking about Gossip Girl.”

For the rest of OUTober, NU Pride will work to support the LGBTQA Resource Center, led by director Jace Kirshner, in putting on weekly events.  At the beginning of the month, the Center will host events more specifically geared toward the LGBTQ community like the Same Sex Domestic Violence Workshop and a Parents’ Weekend Panel Discussion led by the Greater Boston PFLAG.

Near the end of the month, the entire Northeastern community can look forward to “A Night with George Takei,” on Oct. 21 when the Resource Center will host the former Star Trek star and current author and activist in Blackman Auditorium. OUTober will wrap up with Gay-La Masquerade and Drag Show held Oct. 26 in the Curry Ballroom, featuring performers Madge of Honor, Miss Nicholle Pride and Katya Zamolodchikova. Tickets to both events are free, but must be reserved in advance through myNEU.

In addition to campus events this month, NU Pride’s meetings will focus on issues for the LGBTQA community.

“We have a bunch of different meeting topics that are coming up for OUTober which are going to be more digging deep into the community, some more red issues,” Trowbridge said. “This week in recognition of National Coming Out Day, which is Oct. 10, we’re going to be focusing our meeting on coming out and how that affects people and the emotions in that and the things that have to go on while that’s happening, and the toll that takes on people.”

Both the Resource Center and NU Pride hope OUTober serves not only as a month of celebration and pride, but of outreach towards the greater Northeastern community.

“NU Pride is not the gay group, we’re not that place where only gays can come and socialize and do things. We’re the resource group,” Trowbridge said. “‘A’ at the end of LGBTQA stands for allies and we encourage anybody and everybody who wants to be involved in the community and help make a difference in the community or is passionate about the community to join us and give us your input because we value everyone’s input.”

NU Pride hosts weekly meetings Thursdays at 6 p.m. in 11 Kariotis Hall, and the LGBTQA Resource Center is located in Curry 328. For more information on the OUTober events, visit the LGBTQA website at www.northeastern.edu/lgbtqa.