Morehouse Students Get "Reality Check" in S. Africa

Photo credit: monet cooper/Morehouse College Morehouse students Jamison Collier, left, and Clint Fluker, and Mark Rainey, who graduated in May, meet Oprah Winfrey during their visit to South Africa.

By Ayesha Rascoe
Black College Wire

When he looked into the eyes of a 5-year-old South African child with AIDS, Bronson Edwards said, the HIV/AIDS epidemic in Africa became more than just statistics.

Edwards, a dual major in applied physics and mechanical engineering at Morehouse College, now feels a call to action, he said when he returned June 11 from a three-week trip to South Africa.

The time that he and eight classmates spent at Etafeni Daycare Center, a facility that accommodates children affected by AIDS, seems to have had a deep impact on many of the students. It was there, in the Nyanga township of Cape Town, that Edwards underwent "one of the most moving experiences I had: To watch these children who had no idea about life and their lives are destined to be cut short.�

While other students were beginning internships and vacationing, Edwards and his Morehouse classmates joined the Oprah South Africa Leadership Project, a cultural exchange program funded by a $1 million gift from Oprah Winfrey in 1997 and centered on studying the impact of AIDS in South Africa. The trip, sponsored by Winfrey and the Alcoa Foundation, allowed the students to interact with government and social organizations, as well as do volunteer work.

Three students, Jamison Collier, Clint Fluker and Mark Rainey, met with Winfrey. The billionaire media giant was in South Africa for one of her "Live Your Best Life" seminars.

Photo credit: Phillip Howard/Morehouse College Morehouse sophomore Clint Fluker, left, plays with children at Philani Community Center in Khayelitsha, a shantytown near Cape Town.

The Morehouse students helped Winfrey hand out school uniforms to South African children, and accompanied her on a visit to a 16-year-old girl orphaned by AIDS, who was raising six young children.

Collier called Winfrey "a wonderful person" and said he was glad to have the opportunity to tell her how much he appreciates her community service.

In South Africa, as of 2003, an estimated 230,000 children were living with HIV, the virus that causes acquired immuno-deficiency syndrome, according to UNICEF. More than 1 million had been orphaned by the disease. Overall, reports the World Factbook maintained on the Internet by the Central Intelligence Agency, an estimated 5.3 million South Africans were living with HIV/AIDS in 2003, and 370,000 people died in the pandemic that year.

With grim statistics such as these, Edwards was in the country to make a difference. When the students reached South Africa, they crisscrossed the country visiting museums, universities, historic sites, shanty towns and major cities such as Johannesburg.

Now that the young men are back in the United States, they are beginning personal projects aimed at slowing the spread of AIDS abroad and at home, as well as carrying out duties as student ambassadors for the Leadership Project. College officials are making plans to continue the project and further the work that has already been done.

"I�ve always been big on giving back and I knew I had to go international,� said Edwards, who is completing an internship at Harvard Medical School. He is researching cell activity as it relates to HIV and AIDS, and plans to use his abilities to make a difference in the epidemic and in the world.

�As long as I�m maximizing my potential, then regardless of what I do, I will be in the position to help people,� he said.

Photo credit: monet cooper/Morehouse College Morehouse student Nashid Sharrief takes a break during snack time at the Etafeni Playground Project in the Nyanga township of Cape Town.

The chance to volunteer in a country that has been ravaged by disease and racism was one of the driving forces behind Edwards� decision to go on this journey. Others said they were eager to travel.

�My main motivation was just to get to the continent of Africa,� said Collier, a senior accounting major at Morehouse. �It was really a goal I had set from the time I was a freshman.�

Far removed from his native land, Collier was surprised to find out how the American way had permeated much of South African society.

�The similarities are striking,� Collier said. �Johannesburg is very metropolitan, like any city in the U.S.�

He also learned that American pop culture is pervasive in South Africa. Collier said most of his conversations with young South Africans about music involved discussions about 50 Cent and his G-Unit crew, who are popular music artists in that country.

The export of American hip-hop to South Africa was disturbing to Nashid Sharrief, a senior business management major at Morehouse. He said he believed many rappers were negatively influencing the perceptions South Africans have of Americans. Sharrief described incidents where children begging for money would say things like �Hey, nigga� to him and his companions, because the children thought that was how black Americans liked to be addressed.

�Hip-hop individuals are poisoning,� Sharrief said. South Africans "think we�re all about bling-bling.�

While some aspects of South Africa mimicked American life, others stood in stark contrast.

The extreme poverty characterizing many of the townships made some program participants evaluate their lifestyles as luxurious by comparison.

Collier described visiting a grandmother and her nine children just outside of Soweto, living in a squatter�s camp.

�We carried about three boxes of food to this shack and realized 10 people are living in this space about the size of a dorm room,� Collier said. �They probably hadn�t eaten in a few days. It�s really a reality check. It reminded me you have to count your blessings.�

Sharrief said the students should have spent more time on the trip having one-on-one interaction with the people of South Africa, as in the incident Collier described, and fewer meetings with heads of state and religious organizations.

Although he said some improvements could be made to the program, Sharrief plans to carry on the spirit of the trip now that he has returned to the States. He intends to set up a pen-pal system via e-mail, in which incoming Morehouse students can correspond with students in South Africa. He is also trying to open a community center in Atlanta.

Collectively, the Morehouse students are continuing the work they started in Africa through peer education about AIDS on the Morehouse campus and in the surrounding community. A commitment to community service had been required for admission to the program, which involved an intense application process. Students had to enroll in a semester-long course that focused on global relations and the history of AIDS in Africa. Students also were required to volunteer throughout Atlanta, working with people infected with HIV.

Walter Fluker, father of Clint Fluker and executive director of the Leadership Center at Morehouse, which oversees the project, said he and his staff were looking for students who were passionate about public policy, involved in community service and performing well academically.

The director stressed that this project would not end with this trip. Morehouse is scheduled to be host to six South African students next summer.

�This is a program that goes on in perpetuity,� Fluker said. The vision is to replicate the program in other parts of Africa "and to have collaborative efforts with other HBCUs.�

Ayesha Rascoe is a junior studying journalism at Howard University.

Posted June 24, 2005