by Birdie Jaworski
Eleven teenagers swayed in formation on the carpeted floor of the United World College Student Center. Their bodies dipped low, hips rocking to an a cappella beat. Their audience - a group of twenty local middle school students - watched, eyes wide, surprised to hear young men and women chant about a subject usually taboo.
"We're rapping, we're rapping, and you should, too! Wearing a condom will help protect you!"
The HIV/AIDS Peer Education Group at the UWC performed their first public interactive, theatrical presentation on Tuesday, November 20, in the window-lined basement of Montezuma Castle. The group, led by UWC Theatre Arts instructor Tim Crofton, intends to raise awareness around issues associated with HIV and AIDS through their performances.
The group is comprised of students and faculty representing ten countries across the world, including Cameroon, Barbados, Albania, and Austria. Using various theatrical techniques including songs, skits, and audience participation, the presentation is a series of self-contained scenes that help demystify the myths surrounding HIV/AIDS.
"Each session ends with time for specific questions from the audience. Because of the modular nature of the presentation, scenes can be added and subtracted according to the developmental needs of sixth through twelfth grade students in respect to AIDS/HIV," explains Crofton. "It's a serious subject, but the peer group educators allow middle students to relax and have a little fun while learning this important information."
The performance lasted just over half-an-hour. In one skit, a woman, expertly played by Arielle Hawney of the United States, nervously paced inside the invisible walls of a health clinic. A doctor - Nelson Zwane of Swaziland - listened attentively as she asked about getting a test for HIV. Zane addressed the audience with his answers, as if the woman voiced the viewer's own unasked questions.
The information presented was clear, concise, frank, designed to present helpful information about preventing the spread of HIV/AIDS as well as showing compassion and understanding toward those with the disease without passing judgement or promoting any one lifestyle. Issues discussed included how to prevent the spread of HIV/AIDS through sexual contact and drug use, how to ask for an HIV/AIDS test, how to support a friend who has the disease. The troupe showed enthusiasm, maturity, and care in their presentation. Props included balloons used as T-cells, and a human-sized condom costume, eliciting giggles from the audience.
The middle school students sat, rapt, eyes riveted to each scene. When asked for volunteers from the audience, five students quickly lept to their feet. Handed sheets labeled with the days of the school week, each middle schooler read a diary entry from a fictitious student new to Las Vegas, a lonely girl, a girl who contracted HIV through drug use. The volunteers read each entry, their voices close to cracking with emotion as they intoned the thoughts of an ostracized teen on the brink of despair. "I just want to be normal. Some people think that I'm not," read seventh grader Cayla Simpson.
All group members are trained and certified by the New Mexico Department of Health (DOH) as HIV/AIDS Peer Educators and the program is fully endorsed by the DOH.
"The role of parents is paramount in the education of children. The HIV/AIDS presentation is intended to complement parents teaching, not to supplant it," explains Crofton. "We want parents to be involved."
The program ended with the audience members invited to open numbered, sealed envelopes. One by one, attendees read their cards, each printed with a sobering HIV/AIDS statistic. A hush fell over the room as the information was shared. The number of New Mexicans with HIV, the number of Las Vegans with HIV, the methods of transmission, the number of people who die each minute from the disease. Ryan Rifkin, a UWC student from New York, summed up the feeling of his troupe-mates.
"I live in a big city where HIV/AIDS education is taken seriously. But there are places in the United States, still, where there is misinformation about it. We want to help open a dialogue in the community so that every student has access to this important health information."
You can contact Tim Crofton at tim.crofton@uwc-usa.org for more information about the UWC HIV/AIDS Peer Education Group. For information on local HIV/AIDS testing and awareness, call Candy Gallegos at 425-9140 (x106).
