Allyson Robinson

Allyson Dylan Robinson is an American human rights activist, specializing in LGBT rights in the United States. She attended West Point before gender reassignment, graduated in 1994 majoring in her undergraduate degree in physics, and was then commissioned as an officer serving in the U.S. Army until 1999. She held the rank of captain. Also prior to transition, she became an ordained Baptist minister, earning from the Baylor University's George W. Truett Theological Seminary, a Master of Divinity (M.Div.).

In 2008, she joined the Human Rights Campaign (HRC), oversaw HRC's program to create model curricula for LGBT diversity training in the workplace and advanced to the executive director in 2012. She was the first transgender person to lead a national LGBT rights organization that did not have an explicit transgender focus.

Career Prior to transitioning, Robinson majored in physics at West Point and graduated in 1994. Following this, she became an ordained Baptist minister, earning a master of divinity degree in theology with an emphasis on social justice from Baylor University's George W. Truett Theological Seminary in 2007. After transitioning to present as female in 2007, in 2008 she visited West Point and addressed some cadets.

In October 2012 she became the first executive director of OutServe-SLDN, a network of LGBT actively serving military personnel, following the merger of OutServe and Servicemembers Legal Defense Network. Robinson was tasked with bridging the two former groups, and reworking a shrinking budget, having to lay off half the new groups' staff. Nine months after hiring her, OutServe-SLDN's board announced it was bankrupt and had to close its Washington D.C. headquarters; on the same day, Robinson announced that her resignation as executive director would take effect the following day, July 12, 2013.

Personal life Robinson has been married to her West Point classmate Danyelle Juel (Wambach) Robinson since 1994. They have four children. At one point, Robinson contemplated suicide. She claims that an angel of the Lord named Reason convinced her not to kill herself. After this experience, she transitioned to present as female in 2007.

Publications