The Center for Gender, Sexuality and Activism will not have its office space for the 2025-26 academic year due to University-wide budget cuts, according to a statement made Aug. 17 by the CGSA on Instagram.

In its place, the Student Activities Office and the Community Service Center are merging to create the Student Leadership and Impact Center in the space formerly used by the CGSA. 

“This seems retaliatory against counter activists who have historically used the CGSA for organizing and as a safe space,” wrote the CGSA board on Instagram. 

The CGSA, founded in the early 2000s, has been a center for activism on campus across several student organizations. Groups including the Trans Listening Circle, Students for Reproductive Freedom and the now-disaffiliated organizations Quinobequin Student Front for Palestine and Young Democratic Socialists of America worked out of the center. 

“We wanted to open up that space for other groups to come and really feel like they had a home on campus,” said BU 2010 alum and CGSA founder Lolly Spindler.

CGSA remains an official student organization but will no longer have the permanent office space in the basement of the George Sherman Union, BU Spokesperson Colin Riley wrote in an email to The Daily Free Press. 

Senior Mary Haddad, currently suspended from BU, utilized the CGSA through various organizations. She said the loss of the office removes a “safe space on campus outside of administration.” 

The CGSA closure follows an act of vandalism that occurred in the office in March, during which political posters, pride flags and murals were ripped from the walls and furniture was flipped. 

The office was closed shortly after the incident for police investigation and remained closed for the rest of the spring semester, Haddad said. 

The Boston Police Department has been unable to identify a suspect at this time, Riley wrote.

Haddad said she believes the administration is implementing the new office as an “excuse to avoid accountability for allowing an act of vandalism.”  

Riley noted that student protests did not have a part in the decision to close the CGSA. He wrote the CGSA center was closed as part of a “strategic internal administrative reorganization.”

“Boston University consistently affirms the importance of student activism,” Riley wrote. “The CGSA space played a central role in cultivating community and leadership — a spirit that will continue to advance within the Student Leadership and Impact Center.”

The SLIC will be open Monday through Friday, with student staff from the Activities Consultant team managing the front desk. A security assistant student staff will stay until 7 p.m. to ensure the center stays open, according to a statement sent to the DFP by SLIC Director Marget Babson. 

“The CSC will retain its name and identity in recognition of its legacy, though operations will be overseen by the SLIC team,” Riley wrote. 

Students from the CSC will be working out of an office in the former CGSA location, while the majority of the office space will be open for general student use. The new space will also serve as a venue for small SLIC events throughout the year, Babson wrote. 

“Our goal is to continue providing open space for students and groups to gather during the day, and evening,” she wrote.

However, as a center, the CGSA believes in the importance of having a student-run space on campus.  

“The CGSA has always been a space for the students by the students and BU Admin is taking it away,” the CGSA wrote. “They cannot take our ability to create community, to protect each other, and to fight for our right to exist.”