JAIMIE FRANKLIN
News Assistant
About 30 students demonstrated outside Wednesday morning’s student-led Convocation program to raise awareness on the AIDS epidemic and spark student interest in the topic.
The picketing was initiated by Acting on AIDS, a student group that led the convo and gathered support from International Justice Mission and student group Wishing Well to join in the demonstration. Roughly 30 students participated in the protest.
“We wanted to figure out how to get students to pay attention,” Tiffany Gee, president of IJM, said. “It’s so hard to be a student running convo. We don’t want students to just blow it off.”
According to members of the groups, the main objective of the demonstration was to raise awareness, spark student interest and make it clear to students that it was a different type of convo.
“I was a little nervous to see how Pepperdine would react,” said senior Lindsay Joiner, a member of Acting on AIDS and a demonstration participant. “We wanted it to be positive and spread awareness.
It went really well. People were reading the signs and knew that Convo would be something different.”
Junior Stevie Seibert had mixed feelings.
“I thought the sign that said ‘HIV sucks’ was profound,” Seibert said. “But despite my misgivings, it’s generally a good thing that there are people out there doing something.”
The convo was student-led and sponsored by Acting on AIDS, a student organization that focuses on raising awareness and inspiring personal connection with AIDS victims.
Speakers included seniors Dustin Long and Sarai Small, as well as 12-year-old Elizabeth, who has HIV.
Elizabeth was from Camp Kindle, a program that supports children with the disease.
Long and Small, both members of Acting on AIDS, spoke about their personal experiences while visiting Africa, how AIDS affects the individual and what can be done to make change. Long recently spent a summer in Tanzania, volunteering and working with local government officials and teachers in determining what Westerners can do to help.
“I’ve chosen to put myself behind this because of the human toll,” Long said. “I have to make it personal. Statistics aren’t going to grab you by the heart.”
In addition to simply raising awareness, Acting on AIDS runs programs on and off campus throughout the year.
Last year they gathered extra meal points and donated food to an organization in Los Angeles that feeds people infected with HIV and AIDS.
This semester, they are sponsoring Princess Kasune Zulu of Zambia, who is HIV-positive, to speak at Pepperdine, asking students to donate gifts through a catalog and raise money for Africa and supporting a program in which Tanzanians can text message Pepperdine students their questions about AIDS and have them answered.
“I recommend that anyone who’s interested in the cause find a way to get personally involved, and if that’s something they’re looking for, we can provide that,” Long said.
“Our meetings are fun, open-invitation and not about the stats and the numbers but having an experience with a personal connection.”
Meetings are held Wednesdays at 6 p.m. in Lovernich B23.
01-25-2007
