In a classroom at Walker Jones Educational Center, four Howard track athletes, a George Washington soccer player and a former all-American sprinter from Georgetown push tiny desks and chairs against the walls to create a playground for the afternoon’s game.

It’s called HIV Attacks!

And it starts with 12-year-old Natia Bland, who has volunteered to play the Human, standing in the center of a circle surrounded by nine middle-school classmates who pick whatever Germ or Disease they want to be. Continue Reading

March Madness may have already come and gone, but there is still an opportunity to cheer on (and support!) several student athletes who’ve teamed up for an important cause.

Tyler Spencer, a former athlete on the Georgetown University rowing team, created Grassroot Project, an HIV/AIDS education and awareness program targeted to D.C. area youth. Rather than a traditional classroom setting, Spencer, who was a college student at the time, gathered his fellow athletes and took the course to the field where through a unique game dodge ball, their participants learn about the disease. The goal? To provide kids with the tools and information they need to protect them from HIV, which affects 1 in 20 D.C. area residents.

So, what inspired sports as the basis for the program? Continue Reading

WASHINGTON, D.C. – The George Washington School of Public Health and Health Services has partnered with The Grassroot Project, an organization of NCAA Division I varsity athletes using the universal language of sports to engage youth in educational outreach about HIV/AIDS. GW researchers are working with the Grassroot Project to develop and implement a sustainable monitoring and evaluation plan.

“We are using multiple methods including surveys, qualitative interviews, and focus groups with coaches and students to create a full contextual picture of the program and how it affects the lives of those involved,” said Karen A. McDonnell, Ph.D., associate professor and director of the doctoral program in Health Behavior in the Department of Prevention and Community Health.

The Grassroot Project is one of the first 501(c)(3) organization to be designed, initiated, and managed completely by NCAA Division I varsity athletes. Continue Reading

WASHINGTON, D.C. – NCAA News – The Howard University Student-Athlete Advisory Committee (SAAC) received the spring 2010 National SAAC Award of Excellence, as announced on Tuesday by the NCAA and the Division I Student-Athlete Advisory Committee.

The Award of Excellence honors special and unique community-service work completed by student-athletes at Division I schools.

Howard’s SAAC Committee was cited for its participation in The Grassroots Project, a program that educates children ages 10 to 14 about the dangers of HIV and AIDS. Continue Reading

On Dec. 1, approximately 90 students, friends and family members gathered in the Colonials Athletic Club at the GW’s Charles E. Smith Center for a special graduation. Forty D.C. public elementary school students had successfully completed the first semester-long program about HIV/AIDS prevention run by the Grassroots Project, a joint effort between student athletes from GW and Georgetown University.

Eighteen GW athletes, including members of the women’s soccer team, men’s rowing, cross country and women’s gymnastics, worked with their counterparts at Georgetown to devise an interactive eight-week curriculum that addressed how HIV/AIDS is spread and how to make safe decisions about sexual activity.

“We have developed an active way of dealing with the HIV/AIDS crisis in the District,” says Grassroots Colonials volunteer Jake Miner, a member of the GW men’s rowing team. “College athletes are seen as role models by many of these kids. Continue Reading

At an infection rate of 3.2 percent, HIV/AIDS levels in the District exceed the World Health Organization’s classification of an epidemic and rival the rates found in developing countries. The Georgetown community is finding new ways to combat the incurable illness as well as the stigma that has made AIDS a four-letter word.

Treating an Epidemic, Creating a Community

Mary Young, assistant professor of medicine in the infectious diseases division of the Medical Center, serves as the principal investigator of the Women’s Interagency HIV Study. The Georgetown chapter is one of six national sites that together treat over 3,700 infected women. Continue Reading