Chancellor Mike Bishop, MD, will present the Chancellor's Award for Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and/or Transgender (GLBT) Leadership to three members of the UCSF community on Monday, June 11.
The campus community is invited to the ceremony from noon to 1 p.m. in the School of Nursing building, room N 225 on the Parnassus campus. Light refreshments will be served following the ceremony.
The awards will go to:
* Ellen Haller, MD, an adjunct professor in the Department of Psychiatry and co-director of the Lesbian Health and Research Center;
* Cindy Lima, director of administration and co-director of the Mission Bay hospital project for the UCSF Medical Center; and
* Ammon Corl, a doctoral student in the Department of Anatomy and in the neuroscience program.
Ellen Haller
A full-time faculty member of the UCSF Department of Psychiatry since 1988, Haller has been the director of the Adult Psychiatry Clinic at Langley Porter Psychiatric Institute since 2003. As of July 1, she will become the director of the UCSF Psychiatry Residency Training Program.
Haller, who received the 2006 Clinician of the Year Award from the Lesbian Health and Research Center at UCSF, is recognized for significantly contributing to the health and well-being of the GLBT community through education, research and patient care both locally and nationally. She was the invited plenary speaker at the Gay and Lesbian Medical Association Annual Symposium on "Same Sex Civil Marriage, Personal and Mental Health Issues" and gave other national presentations, including speaking about "Lesbian Mental Health Issues" at the Women in Medicine Annual Conference, a forum for lesbian physicians.
Haller has been an officer and active member of the Association of Gay and Lesbian Psychiatrists, the co-director of the Lesbian Health and Research Council and president of the Northern California Psychiatric Society, where she made GLBT issues a topic of focus for the thousands of psychiatrists, residents and students represented by the organization. Since 1995, Haller has been a member of the Northern California Psychiatric Society's Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual Issues Committee, and has been its chair from 1995 to 1997.
At UCSF, Haller has elevated the status of GLBT people, increasing their visibility around campus. She served as chair of the Chancellor's Advisory Committee on GLBT Issues and as chair of the work group planning infusion of GLBT and human sexuality topics into the School of Medicine curriculum. Haller organized a panel in the life cycle block for second-year medical students in which gay, lesbian and transgender patients spoke about their experiences with the health care system. In addition to lecturing students and primary care residents, Haller has spoken to the AIDS Health Project staff on depression in the LGBT community, and talked about gays and lesbians as part of the School of Nursing's cultural competency course.
Haller is also credited with promoting and advancing mutual respect, understanding and appreciation of diversity within the GLBT and campus communities. She has mentored GLBT people on campus, and promoted their recruitment and advancement. She has hosted numerous mentoring events for GLBT students, residents and faculty members at her home.
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Cindy Lima
Lima, a 20-year advocate for all types of diversity at UCSF, is recognized for embodying and promoting respect, understanding and appreciation of GLBT people in the campus community.
As one of the highest-ranking members of the GLBT community in the medical center, Lima is particularly credited for elevating the status of GLBT patients, a once-overlooked group, in a number of ways. She has taken an active role in resolving GLBT patient concerns, taking hours of time to ensure that they feel understood, respected and appreciated.
Lima spearheaded the development of a medical center "Inclusive Language Policy" that has raised awareness of and sensitivity to the GLBT community in part by describing that the term
parent should be used instead of
father or
mother and that
partner is preferred over
spouse or
husband and
wife. Lima also implemented training about the policy that has made a huge and measurable difference in how medical center staff view and treat GLBT co-workers and patients. The policy now has become a national model, which is used in hospitals around the state and the country.
Lima also has championed GLBT issues and concerns in various campus settings, from creating a UCSF Project Open Hand team in the late 1980s, which delivered meals to thousands of San Franciscans with AIDS, to speaking before the UC Board of Regents concerning domestic partner benefits. She also asks how pending decisions and programs affect GLBT people. Lima has helped to create and has participated in career mentoring for GLBT people. She also has helped raise the visibility of GLBT people in part by sharing her story of her marriage at San Francisco City Hall.
Ammon Corl
A seventh-year doctoral student, Corl is a past member of the Chancellor's Advisory Committee on Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender Issues and a scientist. He is currently studying the effects of drugs on the behavior of
Drosophila melanogaster, the fruit fly. Corl is focusing his research on alcohol, what he calls "one of the most abused drugs in the history of mankind." He is investigating the genetic sources of alcohol addiction, a disease that as many as 10 to 15 million people in the United States suffer from, and one that disproportionately afflicts members of the GLBT community.
Corl believes that sexual orientation and addiction are connected in that both are the result of a complex relationship between genetic and environmental factors, which combine to influence behavior. He hopes that his research will one day lead to a better understanding of this relationship, and more effective alcohol education and treatment for all.
In addition to his scientific work, Corl was instrumental in completing the Chancellor's Advisory Committee on GLBT Issues' first annual Visibility Project, in which members of the campus community were highlighted to increase awareness of the crucial role that GLBT faculty, staff, students and trainees play in the fourfold mission of the University. His willingness to put his own face on flyers and post them at the UCSF Mission Bay campus helped get the word out about the GLBT community and welcomed others to it.
