The HIV/AIDS Awareness Committee will hold its third annual benefit concert on Friday.
The free concert will be in Davis Auditorium in Sturm Hall. The doors open at 6 p.m. and performances start at 6:30 p.m.
The event will have performers from DU and community groups featuring vocalists, musicians and dancers, plus a rock band.
Admission is free, but donations are encouraged. Last year, the event raised about $500 in donations said HIV/AIDS Awareness Committee vice president Anandi Ramaswami.
Funds raised at the concert will go to the Colorado AIDS Project (CAP), a 25-year-old Denver organization that provides services for people with HIV/AIDS to live healthier and higher quality lives. CAP has been the recipient of the DU benefit concert’s profits for the last two years.
Money will also go to the African Youth AIDS Foundation (AYAF), a Denver-based organization that works on specific projects to help communities affected by HIV/AIDS in Africa. AYAF was founded by former DU student Amy Kreykes, who also started the HIV/AIDS Committee at DU.
The benefit concert is the committee’s largest event of the year, with 40-50 people attending last year.
The group hopes for a larger turnout this year because representatives from CAP and AYAF will attend and speak, said Caitlyn Tivy, co-secretary.
The HIV/AIDS Awareness Committee has been on campus since 2006 and has about 10 consistent members.
The group’s theme for events and campaigns this year is “It Happens Here Too.” The committee is battling the current misconception that HIV/AIDS is limited to third-world countries, said Tivy.
“Just because this isn’t Africa, for some reason people think this doesn’t happen here,” she said.
The members are localizing the issue to raise awareness to the fact that the disease happens close to home as well.
“We want to highlight that AIDS is still very much an issue in developed nations like the U.S.,” said Ramaswami.
The committee is continuing to raise awareness and increase public consciousness about the disease, which is sometimes seen as a waning problem in the U.S. It is important to keep the problem in the public eye, even though it is not such a raging epidemic as 20 or 30 years ago, said Tivy.
“It still needs attention—awareness both nationally and internationally,” added Tivy.
