Initiative targets LGBT student health

Stanford student affairs professionals hope the Weiland Health Initiative, a new partnership between Counseling and Psychological Services (CAPS) at the Vaden Health Center and the LGBT Community Resources Center, will improve health services for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender students and help members of the university community better understand their needs.

Created in autumn quarter, the initiative is designed to develop best practices in providing health care to students across the spectrum of gender identities and sexual orientation. The program also offers training to student affairs professionals who seek to create a more welcoming environment for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) students.

The initiative already has sponsored a summer conference for professionals who work with LGBT students. Among the other new offerings under the initiative are on-site counseling at the LGBT Community Resources Center, specialized training for Vaden Health Center staff, a postdoctoral LGBT fellowship in CAPS and the development of a university interdisciplinary clinical consulting group.

The initiative results from a gift from the late Ric Weiland, a Stanford graduate who was a software pioneer and one of the first employees of Microsoft. In addition to the initiative, Weiland and his partner, Mike Schaefer, created some 12 different funds at Stanford, supporting everything from graduate fellowships to professorships in the schools of Humanities and Sciences and Medicine.

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