The Polk County Health Department is recruiting volunteers for the Medical Reserve Corps (MRC). Volunteers are needed in a variety of areas and do not need any specific training prior to registering. MRC volunteers have opportunities to assist local public health during large scale emergencies, health department events, and health clinics. To register visit polkcountyiowa.gov/health.

"Strategies of Survival, Resistance, and Resiliency Growing Up Lesbian, Gay, or Bisexual within White Conservative Christian Families"

The purpose of this study is to address the strategies that White lesbian, gay, and bisexual college-age students have employed to survive and develop positive sexual identities having grown up in conservative White Christian families whose notions of homosexuality and bisexuality may have been negative and judgmental.

Mental-health advocates support a local legislator's move to expand crisis services into a statewide bullying-specific hotline.

Rep. Mary Mascher, D-Iowa City, proposed the hotline last week in the Legislature, partially in reaction to the suicide of Iowa student Kenneth Weishum Jr., who was allegedly bullied for being gay.

Iowa will leave $479 million on the table in state revenues unless the state increases the number of adults with postsecondary credentials by 2025.

The new analysis shows to remain globally competitive, the United States will need to produce 24 million additional degrees and Iowa needs to produce 108,807 additional degrees by 2025 to achieve a 60 percent degree attainment rate among adults ages 25 to 64. At current attainment rates, the U.S. is on track to produce just 278,500 additional degrees by 2025 – a significant shortfall.

David Ternier stretched his arms wide above him, titled his head skyward and wailed.

The University of Iowa junior hollered at the top of his lungs with a smile on his face Tuesday night during the finale of the UI's first day of silence in the Take My Voice demonstration.

Radically normal.

That’s the phrase Zach Wahls uses to describe the women who raised him.

And it’s a fitting description of the Iowa City kid-turned-gay rights superstar whose message has resonated with millions of people around the world.

This week, we turn our sights on St. Louis, Missouri, and Saint Louis Effort for AIDS (EFA). According to the Missouri Department of Health, 5,186 people were living with HIV in the St. Louis region at the end of 2010. New diagnoses have steadily increased in recent years: There were 261 new diagnoses in 2009 and 300 in 2010. With this upward trend, it's important to have activists, educators and organizations leading efforts to get people into care and doing outreach to prevent new infections.

TheBody.com recently interviewed Cheryl Oliver, the executive director of Saint Louis Effort for AIDS.

It's been just over a week since a Siouxland teen took his own life. The reason, according to his family and friends was bullying.

14-year-old Kenneth Weishuhn of Primghar was laid to rest last Thursday.

Stephany Lee had an amazing weekend in Iowa. First, she won a berth to the U.S. Olympic women’s wrestling team. She then got married to her partner Brigg McDonald in Cedar Rapids, with Iowa being a state that allows gay marriage. “It was an opportune time,” Lee said in a New York Times article written by our friend John Branch.

"Strategies of Survival, Resistance, and Resiliency Growing Up Lesbian, Gay, or Bisexual within White Conservative Christian Families"

The purpose of this study is to address the strategies that White lesbian, gay, and bisexual college-age students have employed to survive and develop positive sexual identities having grown up in conservative White Christian families whose notions of homosexuality and bisexuality may have been negative and judgmental.