Let’s 
give ViiV a shoutout!
Just recently, Grassroots received a grant from ViiV health care. We are very excited to partner with ViiV and welcome them with open arms. ViiV Positive Action Community Grants are given by local operating companies and their main focus is to ensure that each program is meeting the needs of the community. ViiV Healthcare’s US-based local company supports those HIV/AIDS-focused organizations that aim for HIV/AIDS imbalances in the US. They want to help out and reach out to those organizations that are original, sustainable and that produce a concrete outcome for those communities affected by HIV. Researchers at ViiV health care look to develop new ways to reduce the amount of HIV on 34 million people that are living with the virus.
With this grant, our goal is to complete the following objectives:
Objective 1: It can make such a big difference the more Division 1 athletes get involved, so conducting 2 courses and training over new 100 University student-athletes as facilitators of Grassroots sexual health and life skills intervention will play a major role in getting our point across and reaching out to the community!
Objective 2: Also, we want to implement 10 new Grassroots sexual health and life skills interventions for 300 middle school students in 10 schools meaning 7 programs each semester and host 2 Grassroots graduation ceremonies; Also, one for each semester.
Grassroots teams with the University of Maryland, Howard University, Georgetown University and George Washington University to recruit and train 100 student-athletes as facilitators and HIV educators of Grassroots Curriculum. Training sessions are held in September and in January. When we feel they are ready, these athletes will go to middle schools during the middle schools’ regular physical education and health classes and hold 10 new 8-week Grassroots interventions once a week from October to December and/or January to May followed by a ceremony for each semester. All participating youth, parents, teachers and other community members in HIV/AIDS awareness efforts will have the opportunity to engage and attend Grassroots Ceremony event.
What we want the kids to take from this program is to be equipped with information necessary to make informed decisions about their health, empowered with life skills necessary to make smart and healthy choices and lastly, to let them know that they are supported by positive role models as well as their immediate community, which include teachers, family and friends.
