February 16, 2017, by Claire Henson
Raising welfare awareness during LGBT History Month
Guest post from Sandra Rose, Student Welfare officer in the School of Medicine.
The Welfare teams in the Schools of Medicine and Health Sciences have been celebrating LGBT History Month during February. We have decorated the Student Service Centres at QMC, Derby, City Hospital and Sutton Bonington with rainbow bunting, and staff have the option to wear a rainbow coloured lanyard if they would like to. We’ve also dedicated two noticeboards at the QMC Student Service Centre to information about LGBT events, as well as help, support and advice for students who want to know more. The idea behind this is to help make the Student Services Centre as welcoming and accessible to students from the LGBT+ community as possible and to give them a clear and positive message that they can come to us for support. We also want to help raise awareness of LGBT+ issues within the student community as a whole and promote events which might be of interest to people.
On Monday 13th February 2017 we held a welfare event with stalls and information for students who wanted to find out more about LGBT issues or find out about the Welfare team and the support that we can offer to all students. We were joined by the Healthy U team and also Nottingham Nightline and many students were asking for more information about these services which is great. Free stress balls proved popular, particularly among the Medical Students who are currently taking their Final exams. We also held a charity cake sale with an amazing array of beautiful homemade cakes – including a fantastic Rainbow cake! – with the proceeds going to the LGBT+ Network Nottingham. The cakes were very popular indeed and we raised over £55 for the charity. Thanks to all who baked and purchased the cakes!
Throughout the year the Welfare team at QMC will be doing lots of work to raise awareness for different causes and to help promote health and wellbeing for all our students. Often students may feel that things they are experiencing are unique to them, and it can be very helpful to know that others may be experiencing similar issues, and also, that students know they can come and see a member of the Welfare team for help, support and sign posting to other University services and also to external services.
For more information about health and welfare support for students, visit the Student Services website.
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