AIDS Issues Update: Features:
Apply to attend 6th annual Youth Action Institute!
YAI participants protesting the California budget cuts last year. This could be you!
Good news! The deadline for the Youth Action Institute (YAI) has been extended until March 26. If you’re between the ages of 16 and 26, apply to attend the 6th annual YAI, where youth learn how to become AIDS activists. This year’s conference, which is the jump-off to a summer project and hopefully a lifetime of activism, will be held June 27 to July 2 in Shreveport, Louisiana.
At YAI, participants discover how they can join in the fight against the epidemic from experienced activists living with HIV/AIDS, network with other young people from around the country, and learn the basics of AIDS advocacy from grassroots organizing to lobbying to direct action (i.e. protests and demonstrations!). YAI is a program of Campaign to End AIDS, and many participants became active in the organization after attending YAI, and in AIDS activism in general.
One of this year’s co-chairs, Anthony Roberts Jr., attended last year’s YAI at UC-Berkeley, where the group sprung into action to fight against California’s cuts to HIV/AIDS services.
After YAI, Roberts Jr. immediately dug right into action, and became voted co-chair of YAI’s Campaign to End AIDS youth caucus. He also completed his youth activism project, which was working with his local agency in Miami and helped edit their social media comment book.
“It was almost as though attending the YAI was sitting on the bus and the bus didn’t make any stops,” said Roberts, Jr., now 25. “I got involved personally because my relatives and friends have been infected with HIV,” Roberts, Jr. said. “So I’m affected but not infected. I’m not one to sit back and watch things happen.”
YAI is almost entirely youth-run. The reason the conference is being held in Shreveport this year is that one of last year’s YAI participants Justin Coleman, 21, who’s from Shreveport recommended the location.. “There’s not much activism here around HIV and AIDS,” he said after last year’s conference. “It would be a good thing to open up everyone’s eyes.”
To open up everyone’s eyes in Shreveport and in your community, apply for the Youth Action Institute! If you’re interested in applying, please contact Anthony Roberts, Jr at c2ea@arobertsjr.com or Kimberly Jefferson at drivenfemale3984@yahoo.com
Your inside source for in-depth activism news is updated daily by Staff Writer, Julie Turkewitz
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