The American Federation of Teachers reports that 1,000 South African teachers will die of AIDS this year.

Sue Songer, international student adviser, said Eastern’s University Professionals of Illinois chapter hopes to help lower that number.

UPI is partnering with AFT to address the human rights issues of the AIDS epidemic.

Charles Delman, Eastern’s UPI president, said the chapter will hold a weeklong awareness and fundraiser event in the fall.

Delman said the AIDS fundraiser was originally scheduled for the 2007-2008 academic year, but the speaker UPI hopes to bring to campus for the event, Zimbabwe native James Thindwa, was not available.

An exact date for the fundraiser will bet set once Thindwa’s visit has been finalized, Delman said.

“I think there’s a lot of ignorance about the forms the disease takes, the way it spreads and who’s affected,” Delman said. “But AIDS is not the death sentence that it once was. Working together there are ways that we, as a campus, can help reduce the impact.”

Delman said the money from the campus drive will go towards AIDS education materials for African teachers and students.

“There is such a social stigma with the testing for AIDS that it’s causing just unnecessary transmission of the disease,” Songer said. “If people aren’t aware, the disease will continue to spread.”

Frances Murphy, family and consumer sciences professor, led a study abroad trip to South Africa in the fall of 2006. Murphy will lead another study abroad trip to the region this fall.

While the legal apartheid era in Africa is over, Murphy said many parts of the continent are still suffering economically, making extremely poverty-stricken areas easily accessible in most regions of South Africa..

However, Murphy said she thinks the picture many Americans have in their heads of Africa is unrealistic.

“There is poverty, but there is also extraordinary physical beauty,” she said. “South Africans don’t want to be identified as, ‘Oh yeah, we’re the poor people who are dying of AIDS.’ That’s not how they see themselves. There’s a new democracy there. They have made great strides and they have a lot of hope.”

Songer said her involvement with international students on Eastern’s campus has led her to discover, like Murphy, that African students don’t view themselves the way many Americans do.

“Just as the United States is misinterpreted by the world, we tend to have a myopic view of Africa” Songer said. “Many of the African students have expressed to me that they don’t appreciate that the first thing people think about in Africa is AIDS.”

Songer said she hopes UPI’s awareness effort will help Eastern students learn not only about the AIDS epidemic, but also about how to be more sensitive to other cultures. She said she believes cultural sensitivity and international dialogue are our “links to world peace.”

International students from Africa will have the opportunity to be part of panel discussions that will take place during UPI’s AIDS awareness week, Songer added.

Barbara Harrington can be reached at 581-7942 or bjharrington@eiu.edu.