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October 2007 Monthly Monitor
Advocates for Youth's Youth of Color Initiative
Feature: October is let’s Talk Month
Let's Talk Month is a national public education campaign celebrated in October and coordinated by Advocates for Youth. Let's Talk Month is an opportunity for community agencies, religious institutions, businesses, schools, media, parent groups and health providers to plan programs and activities which encourage parent/child communication about sexuality. Following are some messages to keep in mind when developing programs around parent/child communication:
- Parents can be among the best sexuality educators for their children.
- Parents want to be good sex educators, but may not always understand how to do the job well.
- Children want sex education from their parents or legal guardians.
- It is possible to be an "askable" parent, a caring parent, and a wise counselor.
Click here for more information on Let's Talk Month
Click here to download the Let's Talk Month guidebook and sample materials
Capacity Building & Professional Development
The Minnesota Association of Black Social Workers is proud to present an HIV/AIDS conference entitled, Sexual Behavior in the African American Community: the Hidden Stigma. The conference will be held on October 26, 2007 from 8:00 a.m. - 4:00 p.m. at the Shiloh Temple International Ministries in Minneapolis, MN. Rev. Donald Archey, author of Pastor, How Did You Get AIDS? will be a keynote speaker and the short film "Hidden Closet," by Nhiz Will Productions, will be shown. Youth are especially invited to attend. For more information, please contact Deseria Galloway at (612) 348-5827 or (612) 596-9393.
Body Positive, in collaboration with the Arizona Department of Health Services, is conducting the 2007 Southwest HIV/AIDS Conference: Strength of Mind Health of Body from October 31-November 2, 2007 at the Scottsdale Resort and Conference Center in Scottsdale, Arizona. The curriculum, presented by nationally recognized experts in the field, address issues of addiction, depression, end of life concerns, HIV as a chronic condition, opportunistic infections, HIV and women, and management of HIV complications. Gender sensitivity and cultural awareness will also be addressed. Conference information is available at http://www.bodypositive.org/conference/overview.html
National Minority AIDS Council (NMAC) has announced new dates for HIV/AIDS Stigma Program Trainings. The HIV/AIDS Stigma program offers three individual trainings that focus on how stigma prevents people from seeking HIV testing, counseling, and care, as well as disclosing their sero-positive status. The trainings include:
HIV/AIDS Stigma and Access to Care
April 10-11, 2008 Des Moines, IA
June 19-20, 2008 Denver, CO
HIV/AIDS Stigma and Access to Care: Women of Color
October 25-26, 2007 Albuquerque, NM
February 7-8, 2008 Charlotte, NC
Training-of-Trainers: HIV/AIDS Stigma and Access to Care
August 7-8, 2008 St. Louis, MO
For a description of each training and information about program eligibility, visit http://www.nmac.org/
For more information, contact Aida Gemechu, HIV/AIDS Stigma Program Coordinator, at agemechu@nmac.org or (202) 483-6622, ext. 323.
The Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation is accepting applications for the 2008 Barbara Jordan Health Policy Scholars Program. This opportunity is for college seniors and recent college graduates who have a strong interest in addressing racial and ethnic health disparities, or who are themselves a member of a population that is adversely affected by racial and ethnic health disparities. During their nine-week experience, the Scholars will work in congressional offices in Washington, D.C., obtaining first-hand experience in the policy-making process. Scholars receive roundtrip transportation to Washington, a stipend, and housing at Howard University for the duration of the program.
The application deadline is 5:00pm ET on December 14, 2007. Application materials and more information are available online at http://www.nmac.org/. For questions, please contact program director Cara James, Ph.D., at (202) 347-5270 or program manager Jomo Kassaye at (202) 238-2385.
NMAC Grant Writing Tools: NMAC understands that funding is one the greatest challenges CBOs face. In order to help our constituents identify possible funding sources and write successful proposals, NMAC offers the following grant writing tools:
Online Grant Writing Tutorial -- This tutorial contains information that will help organizations in responding to Request for Proposals (RFPs) for HIV-related services. The Grant Writing Tutorial can be found under Programs and Services on the NMAC website.
Grant Writing Manual -- This manual presents the fundamentals of preparing a successful grant proposal for securing funds from private, public and governmental sources. The Grant Writing Manual can be found in the Download Library in the Organizational Effectiveness Series section. It is also available on NMAC's Greatest Hits, which may be ordered by visiting NMAC's Online Request Store and clicking on NMAC Information and Give-a-ways or by emailing communications@nmac.org
Community Mobilization Training and Skills Development: Aimed at strengthening Black organizational and individual capacity to address the HIV/AIDS epidemic in their communities, the African American HIV University (AAHU) is a comprehensive training and internship fellowship program. It is designed to decrease stigma and misperception and increase the engagement of the Black community in HIV services, by enhancing leadership development and information transfer among key stakeholders.
AAHU ensures participants learn community mobilization strategies and techniques incrementally. It tackles the underlying social, economic and cultural factors that prevent Black people from fully accessing and using HIV services.
AAHU utilizes a unique and effective method for addressing these complex issues. The program is based around the AAHU Community Mobilization method. This 4-part curriculum addresses the barriers that prevent many in the Black community from utilizing HIV services.
How does AAHU build individual and organization capacity? By participating in AAHU, organizations will have the benefit of highly skilled personnel able to strengthen organizational goals in mobilizing their communities around HIV/AIDS. Both organizations and individuals will have:
- Greater capacity to reach out to Traditional Black Institutions in developing partnerships.
- Increased numbers of people in their community and organization who have access to the latest prevention information.
- Increased capacity to engage black communities in accessing HIV services.
Strengthened relationships with traditional Black institutions (TBI) as well as other CBOs and ASOs.
What are the components of AAHU?
AAHU has four components:
- Home Studies- At least two-weeks prior to each training, participants will receive a home study packet to prepare them for the upcoming course.
- Internships- Internships allow participants to apply lessons learned in trainings in order to increase community mobilization around HIV/AIDS. Internships are three months in length and take place in the participants' community.
- Community Mobilization Trainings- Participants travel to Los Angeles for three 6-10 day trainings. These trainings prepare Fellows for their internship activities.
- Community Mobilization Symposium- Fellows will come to Los Angeles to present their community mobilization experiences to peers and representatives of Traditional Black Institutions.
Who can apply to AAHU?
Any organization or individual serving the Black community can apply to AAHU. Priority will be given to:
- Directly or indirectly CDC-funded CBOs/ASOs serving black communities at high risk
- Traditional Black Institutions (e.g. civil rights, social & professional organization, political organizations,
- Historically Black Colleges & Universities, faith-based groups, and black media)
Online applications will be available in October 2007 at http://www.blackaids.org
Announcements
Scenarios USA needs your help to select the winning submissions that will be turned into Hollywood-produced short films. Become a Selection Committee member and join hundreds of people from across the country who will read stories from the Scenarios USA "What's the REAL DEAL?" writing contest. This opportunity is open to young people and adults.
Scenarios USA is a non-profit organization that hosts an annual story, play and scriptwriting contest for youth ages 12-22. Hundreds of young people are currently writing about this year's contest topic: "What's the REAL DEAL about Masculinity?" The winning writers will be partnered with Hollywood directors to transform their stories into short films. Previous directors who have worked with Scenarios USA include Doug Liman (Mr. & Mrs. Smith), Michael Apted (The World Is Not Enough) and Gina Prince-Bythewood (Love & Basketball). Each year an estimated 15 million people watch a Scenarios USA film. Sign up now on their website until November 28, 2007: http://www.scenariosusa.org. Questions? Email them at selectioncommittee@scenariosusa.org or call toll free at 866-414-1044
Partner violence and teen pregnancy linked: A groundbreaking new study finds a significant connection between abusive relationships and teen pregnancy. Published in the journal Ambulatory Pediatrics, the study finds that one quarter of adolescents with histories of abusive relationships said that their abusive partners had actively tried to get them pregnant by manipulating condom use, sabotaging birth control, and making explicit statements about wanting them to become pregnant.
Released by the Center for Reducing Health Disparities, University of California Davis School of Medicine, and conducted by Elizabeth Miller, MD, PhD and colleagues, the study is based on interviews with 61 girls from a variety of racial and ethnic backgrounds with a known history of intimate partner violence who live in the poorest neighborhoods in Boston.
The analysis included 53 girls ages 15 to 20 who reported being sexually active and involved in relationships that included recurring patterns of physical, sexual or emotional abuse from a male partner. One in four of these girls (26 percent) reported that their partners were actively trying to promote pregnancy even when they tried to avoid it. In the face of sabotage such as poking holes in their condoms, some of the girls reported trying to hide contraceptive use from their partners. Others became ambivalent about pregnancy.
"Those of us who work to end dating and domestic violence have long known that abusers often try to control their partner's reproduction, sabotaging their birth control and undermining their efforts to avoid unintended pregnancy,"; said Family Violence Prevention Fund President Esta Soler. "This study demonstrates just how pervasive this problem is. It is deeply disturbing."
More than one-quarter of girls in the study (26 percent) reported having unwanted sex with a dating partner in the last year. "Physicians are trained to think about domestic violence in adult terms," Dr. Miller said. "Our study suggests that health-care providers who come in contact with teens, especially those seeking pregnancy testing and emergency contraception, should ask about the possibility of abuse in the relationship and specifically whether the young woman's partner may be trying to get her pregnant. Pregnancy prevention programs should include discussions about reproductive control as a form of abuse in relationships."
Soler agreed and added, "This very important study looks at the behavior of abusive boyfriends, but it is important to note that other research has shown that many teens in abusive situations have a history of family violence and have been - or are being - sexually and/or physically abused by a family member or someone living in their home. We must be extremely careful that the policies we adopt to protect vulnerable teens from abuse at the hands of family members as well as partners."
In addition to Dr. Miller, the new study was conducted by Michele Decker, MPH; Elizabeth Reed, MS; Anita Raj, PhD; Jeanne E. Hathaway, MD, MPH; and Jay G. Silverman, PhD. It was supported by grants from the National Center for Injury Prevention and Control and the WilliamT. Grant Scholars Program. More information is available at: http://www.ucdmc.ucdavis.edu/newsroom/releases/archives/childrenshospital/2007/teen_pregnancy9-2007.html
Resources
For more resources on parent child communication, please visit Advocate for Youths' online Parent's Sexual and Reproductive Health Education Center.
You can help Advocates for Youth with a contribution today. To donate, visit http://www.advocatesforyouth.org/about/donatetoday.htm
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