Tucked away behind the glass windows along 13th Avenue on the first floor of the EMU is the home to UO’s Outdoor and Bike Program. The small but mighty Outdoor Program office offers resources for students and community members alike, as well as yearlong activities and programming for anyone with a fondness for the outside world.
The Femme, Trans & Womyn Identifying Folk Bike School is a particular workshop hosted by the Bike Program’s office that’s taken off in the past year in an attempt to foster welcoming environments for non-male identifying individuals within the UO and broader Eugene community.
FTW Bike School was created in the spring 2022 term. Bike Program staff members were inspired to create a space that pertained to them and the communities that they belong to.
“The Bike Program has a lot of mechanics that don’t really fit the typical mold of white, cis guy,” Mary McLeavy, a staff member and FTW Bike School organizer, said. “[The FTW Bike School] emerged from a collective agreement that these spaces are important, and a lot of us will benefit from being in these spaces.”
The six week bike maintenance course takes place on Wednesdays from 5:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. in the UO Outdoor Program office, beginning Oct. 12. Each week of the course is dedicated to a different bike maintenance topic which develops in sequential order, ranging from how to fix a flat tire to overhauling a hub on a wheel to detailing and cleaning bikes. The tools learned are important for short and long-term bike care and maintenance.
“Looking back on my experience with bikes, there’s so many issues that I’ve had that can be easily fixed with a phillips-head screwdriver and a set of allen keys,” Logan DeVack, Staff Member at the Bike Program, said, “that’s what’s so profound about bike maintenance, is it’s so accessible, as far as tools go.”
These new skills are also accompanied by the community created from hosting these workshops. While the goal is to certainly learn new skills and share information, it’s just as vital to the Bike Program staff to create a safe space for femme, trans, non-binary and womyn identifying people. The Bike Program practices this through using carefully selected language and pedagogy in these FTW Bike School sessions. The vocabulary the Bike Program selects to use about gender when referring to individuals in the contemporary bike scene has been inspired by other FTW bike mechanic organizations, including Grease Rag Ride & Wrench in Minneapolis, Minnesota, Radical Adventure Riders in Portland, Oregon and Cyclista Zine.
“The idea of FTW Bike School is for folks to build community in order to enhance their bike mechanic skills,” McLeavy said. “It’s definitely a nerdy, bikey space but we do our best to not be snobs about gear or to use alienating lingo or jargon.”
Additionally, the FTW Bike School offers a no-questions-asked scholarship fund that provides financial assistance to applicants who self-identify as low income. The scholarships range from partial funding to 100 percent assistance with the $65 fee for the course.
“The cycling world can be really elitist and expensive, and I’ve always been drawn to spaces where you can do things at low or no cost,” McLeavy said.“And that’s 100 percent what this space is.”
Students and Eugene community members wanting to participate in activities through the Bike Program can stop by the UO Outdoor Program Office, open Monday through Friday from 12 p.m. to 5 p.m. Students can also sign up for events over the phone by reaching their office at 541-346-6092. The Outdoor Program staff also highly encourages anyone to use the space, even if it’s outside of Bike School hours.
“At the end of the day, we want to empower people to fix their bikes,” McLeavy said.
