Educating to a ‘Cure’

Jenny is a Campus Organizer.

My name is Jenny and I have been an HIV/AIDS Peer Educator for two years. When I was a sophomore in high school, I read a school announcement for tryouts to become a “Sunny D”. I decided to tryout. What could it hurt? During the 28 hour Red Cross HIV/AIDS fact training required of me as a new “Sunny D”, I fell in love with my newly acquired ability to ‘bust’ the myths and stigmas associated with HIV/AIDS with cold hard facts. A school announcement that I just happened to stumble upon changed my life as I would know it. “Sunny D’s”, the HIV/AIDS Peer Education group at my high school, gives two days of presentations to each freshman health class. The first day we present “REACH-Out” and the second, we do a facts training. “REACH-Out” is a program created by the Nebraska AIDS Project (NAP) in which the presenter embodies one of seven scripted personalities and tells a story about being affected/infected by/with HIV/AIDS. The scripts are true stories of some of NAP’s clients and each have a slide show to accompany them. I ‘play’ the part of Meghan—the all-American girl who gets infected by her cheating boyfriend during her junior year of high school. The hope of these scripts is to provide insight into the personal side of the infection before we ‘beat’ their brains with the facts.

I believe this setup is effective, but only to a certain extent. It is nice to get the chance to be involved with each health class but by graduation all of the students have forgotten any information that was given during the presentation. It would be nice to have some follow-up—at least once a year—to better arm students for being safe at college.

In early February of my senior year in high school, I decided to attend Hastings College. Trying out for “PHIVE-O” (Peer HIV Education Organization) seemed like the logical next step. There was just one problem; “PHIVE-O” was only for sophomores and up. I approached the sponsor of “PHIVE-O” and she consulted with my fellow “PHIVE-Oers” who decided that because I was certified it would be ‘ok’ to let me in the group.

I will soon attend a refresher course in the facts and begin presenting at the college level. I am very excited to present to my peers but am disappointed with the administration of the college because we only get one day to present to every freshmen.  For some, this will be the first time they have had any sexuality education, which is extremely dangerous. I plan to fight the one day limit so that the “Sunny D’s” and the “PHIVE-O’s” can do a more effective job of teaching our youth that risky behavior may result in a life-long disease. I fully believe that education can be the most effective ‘cure’ of HIV/AIDS and many other STD’s.