Healthy Lesbian, Gay and Bisexual Students Project

The Healthy Lesbian, Gay and Bisexual Students Project (HLGBSP) was funded by the Division of Adolescent and School Health of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC-DASH) from 1999 to 2011. The project provided HIV prevention capacity-building assistance services to help increase the capacity of state and local K-12 education agencies to deliver effective school-based HIV prevention services to lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and questioning youth, particularly young men of color who are attracted to men. The centerpiece of the project was a full-day training workshop titled: "Preventing Health Risks and Promoting Healthy Outcomes among LGBQ Youth: A Training Workshop for School Counselors, Nurses, Psychologists and Social Workers." 

• The American Library Association’s Rainbow Project Bibliography lists books and other resources for young people that reflect LGBT individuals, groups, and experiences.

• ACT (Assets Coming Together) for Youth, a collaboration of Cornell University, University of Rochester, and New York State Center for School Safety, provides extensive resources and research on positive youth development with an emphasis on sexual and reproductive health.

• The National Research Council of the National Academy of Sciences published Adolescent Health Services (2009) to examine the health status of adolescents and provide guidance on investing in, strengthening, and improving an integrated health system for young people.

• It’s Your Sex Life is a public information campaign for adolescents conducted by the Kaiser Family Foundation in partnership with MTV. The new Get Yourself Tested campaign is one component of it.

• Advocates for Youth offers Creating Safe Space for GLBTQ Youth: A Toolkit, which provides tips and strategies that aim to help service providers create a climate in their organization that will make everyone feel safe.

• President Obama: It Gets Better
  President Obama shares his message of hope and support for LGBT youth who are struggling with being bullied.

• HIV and AIDS among African American Youth Rising (PDF, 132 KB)
  The CDC released this fact sheet featuring current data on African American youth, the population most severely affected by HIV infection in the United States.

• HIV/AIDS Rates are Rising Rapidly among Black Young Men
  A graph illustrating the cases of HIV and AIDS diagnosed among young men ages 15-19 (all sexual orientations), by race/ethnicity and year of diagnosis, 2004-2007 in 39 areas with confidential, name-based HIV infection reporting.

• Among Teens, 40% of New HIV/AIDS Diagnoses in 2006 were among Black Gay Young Men
  A graph illustrating the number of persons aged 15–19 years diagnosed with HIV or AIDS in 2006 by sex, race/ethnicity, and mode of HIV transmission in 33 states and five US territories with confidential name-based HIV infection reporting.

• Report of the American Psychological Association Task Force on Appropriate Therapeutic Responses to Sexual Orientation (PDF, 816 KB)
  In August 2009 APA released this task force report conducted a systematic review of the peer-reviewed journal literature on sexual orientation change efforts (SOCE) and concluded that efforts to change sexual orientation are unlikely to be successful and involve some risk of harm. The appropriate application of affirmative therapeutic interventions for those who seek SOCE involves therapist acceptance, support, and understanding of clients and the facilitation of clients’ active coping, social support, and identity exploration and development, without imposing a specific sexual orientation identity outcome.

• Sexual and Reproductive Health of Persons Aged 10–24 Years—United States, 2002–2007
  In July CDC released this surveillance summary, which compiles data from multiple surveys into a single reference report to make the information more easily accessible to policy makers, researchers, and program providers. The report addresses three primary topics:
  
  1) current levels of risk behavior and health outcomes;
  
  2) disparities by sex, age, race/ethnicity, and geographic residence; and
  
  3) trends over time.
  
  Of particular interest, this report includes—for the first time—HIV infection data for teens ages 15–19 disaggregated by sex, race/ethnicity, and mode of HIV transmission (Table 16). It shows that young Black gay men comprised 40% of new diagnoses in 2006, and that youth HIV infection rates are rising rapidly, as illustrated in the charts below.

• HIV/AIDS and Young Men Who Have Sex with Men (PDF, 1 MB)
  HIV Testing among Adolescents (PDF, 644 KB)
  Recently released CDC-DASH fact sheets.

• The Family Acceptance Project
  San Francisco State University has released groundbreaking research that correlates a family’s degree of rejection of LGB youth with negative health outcomes when they are young adults.

Disclaimer: This site is supported under Cooperative Agreement U58DP000440 with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Its contents are solely the responsibility of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the official views of CDC or the US Department of Health and Human Services. This site contains HIV prevention messages that may not be appropriate for all audiences.