UCLA
LGBTQ Campus
Resource Center

Vanessa Aviva González-Siegel

LGBTQ CRC Director

Headshot of LGBTQ CRC Directory, Vanessa Aviva, with a white top and pink pants next to a colored wall

Vanessa Aviva González-Siegel

Director
Email: vgonzalez@lgbtq.ucla.edu
Pronouns: she/ella/ela

Vanessa Aviva (she/ella/ela) is a native New Yorker and a proud Cuban-American Queer & Trans Woman. Previously, she served as the Associate Director of Multicultural Affairs and LGBTQ Outreach at Columbia University as the sole full-time position serving LGBTQ students since 2018. During her time at Columbia, Vanessa was also asked to serve as Interim Associate Dean of Multicultural Affairs acting as diversity officer for the undergraduate colleges. Prior to her work at Columbia, Vanessa was the inaugural Assistant Director for the Office of Diversity and Campus Engagement at Sarah Lawrence College.

Vanessa is a nationally-recognized and award-winning advocate and speaker having earned awards and recognition from the National Conference on Race & Ethnicity, the Consortium of Higher Education LGBT Resource Professionals, Campus Pride, the National Women’s Studies Association, Rutgers University Alumni Association, the Biden Administration, and more. She is an emerging scholar in organizational theory and TQ center(ed) diversity work as member of the LGBTQ Participatory Action Research Collective. Outside of her full-time work, she serves on the board and as co-chair of NCORE’s QTPOC Caucus and as the Practitioner-in-Residence for ACPA-CSGI. Outside of higher education, Vanessa serves on the Board of Directors for the New York Transgender Advocacy Group and COLAGE and is a public speaker managed by SpeakOut.

Vanessa received both of her Bachelor’s degrees from Rutgers University-New Brunswick in Women’s Studies and Social Justice Education, her Master’s degree from Teachers College, Columbia University in Higher & Post-Secondary Education, and is currently a doctoral student at the City University of New York in Organizational Leadership, Development, and Change. In her (limited) free time, Vanessa Aviva is a foodie, beach bum, housewives stan, avid solo world traveler (25 countries & counting), and loves to cook and entertain people.

Vanessa has a passion for serving students and the community and prides herself on relationship building and collaboration and brings a strong understanding of intersectional approaches to LGBTQ+ work in higher education. We are thrilled to have her join the team at the LGBTQ Resource Center.