Transgendered student, school spar over name

By Alison Hewitt, Staff Writer

• Video: Transgender in the San Gabriel Valley

POMONA - Cal Poly Pomona graduate student Olympia Tveter is busy getting everything in order for her expected graduation in a couple of months - going to classes, finishing her thesis, and making sure her diploma bears the correct name and gender.

For Tveter, getting her diploma right is unusually difficult.

Olympia enrolled as Jared, but has since transitioned to living full-time as a female. Her dress, speech and walk are feminine. Her credit card, bank account, and student loan are in her new name, and she checks the box marked "F" on forms asking her sex.

But Cal Poly Pomona isn't ready to see her that way without a court order or government-issued identification, a university official said.

It's just one of the many challenges Tveter faces as a result of her transition. Anecdotal evidence shows she is one of a growing number of people who are going public with their decision. . . .

Fundraising parties for trans surgery are all the rage, but don't tell Kerry Downey that.

Bye, Bye, Boobies

Fundraising parties for trans surgery are all the rage, but don't tell Kerry Downey that.

by Tricia Romano

June 19th, 2007 5:16 PM

Kerry Downey wants a less curvy profile (left) for her androgynous look (right).
photo: Alana Cundy

In the back room of Galapagos, a young, artsy crowd watched the queer-friendly, all-girl rock band Marla Hooch perform a raucous pop-punk set. Lights cast a pink blush on the space, and the crowd—a mix of tattooed-and-pierced dykes, fresh-faced collegiate straight boys, and fashionable girls in sexy dresses—danced to the band.

In the center of it all was Kerry Downey; it was her party, and well-wishers came up to the lanky woman to give her kisses and hugs. Dressed in a button-up shirt, bow tie, top hat, and slim-fitting pants, she was beaming, but not nearly as much as her breasts were, lit up by LED lights to call attention to them. Downey hoped, however, that this would be one of the last times in her life that her 34-Ds would be the focus of attention. . . .

Marci Bowers, M.D., surgeon

Trinidad's transgender rock star

By Douglas Brown
Denver Post Staff Writer

Article Last Updated: 07/01/2007 09:54:08 AM MDT

The small Colorado town of Trinidad has more than three decades of experience with lantern-jawed, 6-foot-3 women in magenta tube tops and strappy platform sandals passing through.

The town's deep and unlikely attachment to the procedure that turns men into women could have ended in 2003, when Dr. Stanley Biber, a one-man industry, put down his scalpel after 35 years of performing his signature surgery.

But Marci Bowers, a gynecological surgeon in Seattle, decided to train with Biber shortly before he retired.

And that's when sex-change in Trinidad moved from a cottage industry into the big time. . . .

Bathroom