Week examines children's rights

A Campus Y committee aimed to educate students and faculty about the rights of children throughout the world this week, as they celebrated Children's Rights Week with a variety of informative campus events.

Helping Youth by Providing Enrichment, a committee that mentors children from low-income families in Orange County, is looking to increase awareness on issues such as violence in schools, the death penalty for juveniles, child abuse and the AIDS epidemic in Africa.

Abby Michaud, co-chairwoman of HYPE, said increasing awareness of children's rights is important because children are defenseless and represent the world's future.

"Children are a group that can't advocate for themselves, so someone else has to do it," she said. "We really need to be looking out for them."

Monday night, members of Health Focus, World Camp for Kids and Students for Students International held a talk about working with children in Africa and their programs for HIV and AIDS education.

Hilary Lippert, a volunteer for S4SI, said AIDS is an epidemic in places like Zanzibar, an island off the coast of Tanzania, partly because the subject is taboo.

"They say it's what you get when you're married," she said, citing infidelity a major culprit.

Because children in places such as Zanzibar, Malawi and India often don't receive sex education, representatives from the groups said it is important to teach them about HIV and how to prevent it.

Patrick Hall, coordinator for World Camp for Kids at UNC, said 25 percent of Malawi's population is HIV positive. "The average age a Malawian becomes sexually active is 11."

He added that one-third of the teachers there are HIV positive and that it is not uncommon for them to have sexual relations with students.

Hall said that despite parents' and teachers' opposition to teaching sex education, students are interested in learning the facts. "Young people are very receptive to what we're saying," he said.

Several committees held a demonstration in the Pit on Tuesday to increase awareness of the genocide that now is occurring in Sudan.

Anna Thompson, president of Students United for Darfur Awareness Now, encouraged people to write to their congressional representatives about the issue and to sign petitions for humanitarian groups.

"The (Sudanese) government is supporting a militia that is killing blacks and driving them from their homes," she said. "Sixty to 80 thousand have been murdered."

Stephen Lassiter, co-chairman of Students for the Advancement of Race Relations, said students who want to help can join any campus organization that supports the cause, sign petitions to end the eth relief organizations.

"First comes awareness, and then comes action," he said.

Keynote speaker Lewis Pitts discussed advocating children's rights Tuesday night, and on Wednesday the Orange County Rape Crisis Center held a session about how to recognize child abuse.

Teach for America held an information session Thursday on how volunteers can educate America's underserved public school students.

Gus Van Sant's "Elephant," a film that explores the issues of youth and school violence, was shown Thursday night.

At 6 p.m. tonight, Campus Y organizations are sponsoring a movie night, featuring "Shrek 2," with volunteers and kids with the Big Buddy and HYPE programs.

Michaud said she hopes the week's events facilitate discussion of children's rights and encourage people to seek solutions.

"We just really hope to reach as many (students and faculty) as we can, and if people even came to one event, I think it would make a big difference on our campus."

Contact the University Editor at udesk@unc.edu.