Sergio Cereceda Stone was born 16 April 1942 in the coastal city of Valparaiso, Chile. Stone's mother Luz was a housewife and caretaker for Sergio and his younger brother Lionel; his father Sergio served among the country's twenty appellate court judges. In the early 1950s Stone's father relocated the family to Santiago to further his law career. There Stone attended the Jesuit elementary and high school Collegio San Ignatius, finished in the top ten percent of his class, and met José Balmaceda, his future coworker at the Center for Reproductive Health in Irvine, California. From San Ignatius, Stone went on to the University of Chile Medical School where he finished his obstetrics and gynecology residency. In 1969 he accepted a grant from the Ford Foundation for advanced research in endocrinology.