please tell me how this sounds

so I'm trying to write a thing to an old camp director of mine.
I want to tell him, politely as possible, that his camp could be more transgender-friendly, and that I have some suggestions for how he could go about making it more transgender-friendly.
only problem is, I'm bad at thinking how others will read stuff I write in terms of tone and such, and while I've tried to be nice and professional, I don't know if I succeeded. if people wouldn't mind reading what I've written, and telling me what they think, that would be cool.
here it is:

Hi, Jim!
I apologize for not getting back to you right away—this is a very sensitive topic that I’d like to talk to you about and I wasn’t totally sure how to phrase things, so I took some time to figure out what, exactly, I wanted to say.
I’d like to preface this by saying that I’ve been to SLTP, twice, two summers in a row. I went to LTC twice and ALC once, and I don’t know if you’ll remember me, but at the time I went by the name Emi Thuotte. Now I go by Alex, which leads me into what I want to talk about.
I didn’t go back for a third year at SLTP not because of reasons of disliking camp—I loved the camp. Camp was wonderful and one of the best experiences of my life, and I really did want to go back, because it was always such a wonderful experience. Everyone was so welcoming and open and friendly and it was incredible, and I felt very at home at SLTP. However, the year that would’ve been my third year at SLTP, I started questioning my gender identity, and came to realize I was transgender. This created a lot of anxiety for me. When you’re new to being transgender, you aren’t really sure how to work things into conversation—when do you tell people what pronouns you prefer? How do you explain your name change? What do you do and who do you talk to if your roommates say or do transphobic things? For that matter, where will you be roomed? In the place where you go according to gender identity, or in the place where you go according to your sex? What do you do if people misgender you? How do you explain all this to the staff? Will the staff be supportive of you?
While I’m sure the staff at SLTP would’ve been wonderful about my being trans, as I know firsthand that you are all very accepting and welcoming and do your best to make everyone feel at home, I just wasn’t sure what to do or how to handle it. So I ended up not going, which brings me to the crux of the matter: if SLTP was more trans-friendly in small ways, I think I would’ve been much more comfortable going back.
I’m not suggesting you should go all out and start talking about trans-specific issues at the camp, but I think there are small changes you could make that would make the camp overall more trans-friendly. This, in turn, will make transgender kids who might be there feel more comfortable. It’s also likely to make kids who discover they’re transgender worry less about going back and telling people that. Additionally, plenty of people who aren’t trans know trans kids—if your camp tweaked things a bit to be trans-friendly, those people who know trans kids would probably go home and say, “This camp is incredibly trans-friendly, so different from any other camp I’ve ever been to! I think you should go there!”
The sad truth of the matter is, not a lot of camps out there are trans-friendly. Not a lot of places in general are trans-friendly, and the general populace is largely uneducated about how to deal with a person who is transgender in a respectful way. If you tweaked a few things to make the camp more trans-friendly, I really think it would make a big impact and all the difference in the world to transgender kids and their friends, and make those transgender kids feel like they really have a place they can go to that’s safe and welcoming to them, a place where they can really be themselves, which might not apply to their school or even their home.
With all that said, I have some small suggestions about what could be tweaked to make the camp more transgender-friendly, if you would like to hear them. I’ve thought long and hard about what I think should be done, and I think my suggestions are ones that would make a big impact while not being huge, overbearing changes.
Sincerely,
Alex

so.........thoughts? how can I make it better? is it bad? what do I need to say that I haven't said? is it good? did I sound professional?

 

I am going to give those in a different email--first I'd like to know if he actually wants my suggestions. if he doesn't, I don't wanna waste his time. if he does, I have a set of suggestions all ready to go in a separate draft of the second email! but thank you :D I'm glad you think it sounds good.

 

as far as I can tell, you seem both polite and professional to me! the only advice I could give would be to maybe try to be a little more concise? it seems a little long for your goal of asking if he's interested in hearing more.

then again, that could absolutely just be my adhd acting up, and you know better than I do what amount of information this person would want right off the bat, since you seem to actually know him. so... grain of salt.

I say go ahead and send it, if you haven't already done so! (also - good luck! it sounds like you're trying to do a pretty cool thing.)

 

Jim is not a long-winded person, and doesn't like long-winded things, so I probably should try and find ways to shorten it...I'm not entirely sure how I'll manage that, but I'm sure there's parts I can clip and snip to make it more to-the-point.
I will do that, and then send it!! (thanks!! I'm really hoping it goes well, because I think it would make a big difference to me and kids like me.)

 

screeches
I got a response
he said that he'd like to hear my suggestions
I'm freaking out
I didn't expect to get this far

 

@chaoticArbiter congrats, dude! feel free to post your suggestions on this thread for feedback. also, my name is Alex too! what a coincidence. (I didn't pick it, though, my mom did. weird story.)

 

waves frantically
hello fellow Alex

also I liked the idea of posting my suggestions here for feedback, so!

small ideas:
- add a ‘gender identity’ space on the applications for camp and such
- incorporate asking for pronouns into the ‘things to do while at camp to show you respect others’ (at the start of camp, Jim and the other staff members demonstrate how to properly greet another person while you’re at camp, and I think incorporating ‘ask what their pronouns are’ with a brief description of what pronouns are for those who don’t know would really help trans kids)
- if a kid is openly transgender, have the staff check in with that kid on the second or third day to make sure their roommates are being nice and there’s no, like, rampant transphobia happening

big ideas:
- room kids by gender identity when possible, rather than by sex
- have the staff members take a sort of transgender sensitivity training (this would help them be up to date on what to expect, what terminology exists, what questions to avoid, etc.)

anyone got anything I missed or any feedback?

 

I would put the suggestions directly into the first e-mail. Sometimes people think inclusivity is more work than it actually is so he may not follow-up with asking for the suggestions. If you put them out there directly, he can see it wouldn't actually be that hard to incorporate them.

 

I already sent the first email :P and he did respond asking to see them, so I think I got lucky in this respect! in the future I'll include the suggestions in the first email, though. thank you for the advice!!

 

Sweet! Way to be an advocate!

Also, I reread the thread and noticed you already said you sent it before my post. My bad.

 

it's cool! :) I'm glad you all think I did a good job with this, though. I'm gonna wait a bit to see if anyone has any suggestions on my ideas, and then write up a nice email and send it.

 

indeed, hello! also I feel like Jim will probably have concerns about rooming kids by gender identity rather than sex because of parents' reactions. do you have any ideas about how to persuade concerned parents? also just personally I think a general policy of letting kids room where they want, instead of saying they have to room by gender identity, might make more kids comfortable. I for one know that although I'm a trans guy if I were staying with camp-age kids I would definitely want to room with girls over boys just because I feel like they might be a little more accepting. (actually this is a decision I'm going to have to make next year—picking a binary dorm to live in, that is—and I think I am going to stay in a girls' dorm. I just won't be one of said girls.) and I imagine that there are other kids out there who would also actually feel more comfortable living with the "wrong" gender. so maybe adjust your wording there a little bit? otherwise I think your suggestions are great.

 

I say have them room by the gender they say they are rather than sex because Jim's not exactly....comfortable with co-ed dorms, and if he let trans kids pick which dorm they want to be in, I bet there'd be kids complaining about special treatment, but I can suggest he let them dorm with whichever gender they want to dorm with!
as for convincing concerned parents, I...think it might help if I knew why they were concerned? I mean, if they're worried about sex: a. there's two kids per room so unless it's an orgy sex is unlikely and b. straight trans people are a thing, so they're not necessarily going to be attracted to the same gender that they are and could be fine rooming with them and c. if we are concerned about sex rooming people by sexual orientation would make much more sense c. the camp goes from really early until really late and I doubt anyone's going to have time for sex or anything like that. we're all too exhausted to even think about romance and shit.

 

yeah, that sounds like a good suggestion!
and yeah, I think they would be worried about sex, and in my experience the kind of parent who freaks out about that kind of thing is not going to respond well to any kind of reasonable argument. and I mean, I don't have any suggestions either. but if Jim's willing to argue with them it'll probably be fine.

 

okay, cool!
and I mean. yeah. but in the end I think it would be best to just tell them up front that trans kids are allowed to pick which gender they want to dorm with, and if you don't want to send your kid to camp after that that is your decision.

 

thanks!!
I'm pretty happy that he's open to hearing my suggestions because I wasn't super sure he would be? but I'm really glad I did the thing.