More than 200 people enjoyed an evening of pageantry at The Mount Sinai Charity Drag Race, an event inspired by the reality television competition RuPaul’s Drag Race, in Goldwrum Auditorium on Thursday, January 31. Organized by two Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai groups that are dedicated to supporting LGBTQ+ participation in the sciences, oSTEM (Out in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) at Mount Sinai and the Stonewall Alliance, the event raised more than $2,700 for the Ali Forney Center—a Harlem-based nonprofit dedicated to protecting homeless LGBTQ youth.
Hosted by New York City-based celebrity drag star Lagoona Bloo, the event featured four Icahn School of Medicine students who entertained the crowd with rousing lip synchs, as well as a talent portion that included a martial arts demonstration using nunchuks, and a stand-up comedy routine. Contestants were judged by Mount Sinai’s Ann-Gel Palermo, DrPH, MPH, Associate Dean for Diversity in Biomedicine, and Jerry Chipuk PhD, Associate Professor, Oncological Sciences and Dermatology, along with Tyler Neasloney, Special Events and Communications Manager at the Ali Forney Center.
“The idea started as a joke, an over the top event idea that we definitely did not have the means to pull off,” says organizer Christopher Panebianco, PhD candidate in Biomedical Sciences, at the Icahn School of Medicine. “Over the course of several months, this pipe dream snowballed into something fantastic, drawing diverse members of the broader Mount Sinai community together for a worthy cause.”
Lagoona Bloo, back row center, surrounded by contestants and organizers from the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, in alphabetical order: Eziwoma Alibo, Benjamin Ben-Zvi, Phil Cohen, Tristan Fehr, Akio Kozato, Tyler Martinson, Don Nguyen, Christopher Panebianco, M.Q. Perkins, and Zebulon Vance.
