Scholars Embrace the Challenge of AIDS Education

While much of the attention paid to pandemic illness today focuses on the potential for a deadly avian flu outbreak, Hollins seniors and Batten Scholars Nessa Ryan and Kate Stanley are supporting the physicians and educators who know that a real pandemic continues to rage, particularly in the developing world.

AIDS is the world’s number-four cause of death and the number-one cause in Africa. Even though deaths from AIDS have dropped sharply in the United States in recent years, the United Nations estimates that more than 30,000 new cases still develop in this country annually.

With this knowledge, Ryan and Stanley joined forces during their sophomore year to make HIV/AIDS education their Batten Leadership Institute project. “AIDS is really prevalent at this time in our lives, yet our generation lacks understanding about the disease,” explained Stanley. “It has had such a huge global impact, especially in developing countries, but many people remain unaware of it.”

“There are still so many stereotypes about HIV,” added Ryan. “We were both shocked at how people our age continue to have misconceptions about how it’s transmitted and who is at risk.”

Ryan and Stanley started the AIDS Awareness Coalition at Hollins in spring 2005 and put into place a number of initiatives to educate the campus community. They coordinated HIV testing days and organized yard sales and flea markets as fundraisers to benefit local and international organizations dedicated to fighting the disease.

But they took on their biggest challenge when they decided to broaden their commitment and travel to where AIDS has had its most devastating impact:

In January 2006, they spent three weeks as part of an organized effort to educate rural populations in the West African country of Ghana.

In this nation of just over 21 million residents, the U.N. estimates that 320,000 people are living with HIV/AIDS, including 180,000 women and 25,000 children. Approximately 29,000 deaths resulted from AIDS in 2005, and 170,000 children have lost a mother or father or both parents to the disease. Against this backdrop, Ryan and Stanley worked on a grassroots public health campaign based in Ghana’s second largest city, Kumasi.

“We were part of a group of about twenty volunteers who would cram into a barely running, ten-passenger van every morning and go out into surrounding villages and speak informally about HIV,” said Ryan. “The people were very receptive—we would go to businesses, schools, churches, or anywhere groups of people were congregating.” The volunteers employed a program called ABC (Abstinence, Be Faithful, Condom Use) and used skits, storytelling, and flash cards to create an interactive experience for all ages and encourage people to ask questions.

“The only hospital in the country with a government subsidized program that provides medicine for HIV/AIDS patients is located in Kumasi,” said Stanley. “Patients often have to travel as much as eight hours each way every month to get treatment. But the program is able to give them medicine that regularly costs $50 for only $5. That’s significant when the average income is only $30 a month.”

She added that in Ghana the stigma of AIDS, which in Africa is spread primarily by heterosexual contact, contributes to the spread of the disease, making education especially vital.

“People either don’t know they have it, or if they do they feel they can’t tell anyone. Then they continue to engage in risky behaviors. Plus, there is much that is innate in the culture that makes it more difficult for women to protect themselves against AIDS. By raising awareness we were hoping to empower them and give them a voice.”

Ryan and Stanley agree that while they only spent twenty-one days in Ghana, the experience was life altering.

More than ever, they are committed to HIV/AIDS education and together coordinated AIDS Awareness Week at Hollins to coincide with World AIDS Day on December 1. In summer 2006, Ryan worked at the Centers for Disease Control as part of their focus on eradicating tuberculosis, and she now wants to pursue a master’s degree in public health. Both eventually plan to attend medical school.

Batten Leadership Institute Director Abrina Schnurman-Crook cites Ryan and Stanley’s project as one of her favorites since the institute’s inception.

“It just goes to show what amazing things can be accomplished if you’ve got vision and you pursue it with dynamic energy. They did the hard work and they persevered. I’m just so proud of them.”

The two seniors credit the Batten Leadership Institute for giving them the foundation for their current and future accomplishments. “If I hadn’t done Batten, I wouldn’t have been able to determine what my interests are and where I can best focus my energies,” said Ryan. “The program builds a whole person and helps you mature as a person.”

Stanley noted, “From the first day, I have become much more confident in my speaking ability as well as in my daily interactions with people. Batten has enhanced my leadership skills in all aspects. I don’t think I would have done the HIV/AIDS awareness project if Batten hadn’t been a part of it.”

- From HOLLINS Winter 2007