Project ARM: John Shaw Memorial Scholarship Call for Application

Project ARM—Africa for Rectal Microbicides—is a long-term, sustained project which aims to develop community capacity around rectal microbicide advocacy in order to ensure broad participation in research activities and well-informed community input into the development of an African rectal microbicide agenda. The end goal is enhanced rectal microbicide advocacy in Africa as well as the planning and implementation of rectal microbicide trials on the continent. Project ARM is coordinated by International Rectal Microbicide Advocates (IRMA). First year funding for Project ARM has been secured from the United States National Institutes of Health – Office of AIDS Research and the New Venture Fund. AVAC is also partnering with IRMA on this initiative.

Project ARM evolved from discussions initiated by IRMA through its listserv, and from input received from African advocates and partners at two informal meetings held in conjunction with the Microbicides 2010 (Pittsburgh) and AIDS 2010 (Vienna) conferences. A working group was formed following the Microbicides 2010 meeting, and has guided this process ever since. There are now 60 working group members including advocates and community members, researchers, funders and policy-makers from 10 African countries, as well as a few key international partners.

In order to develop an African rectal microbicide agenda that articulates research, advocacy and community mobilisation strategies, IRMA is hosting a working meeting on 2-3 December 2011 in Addis Ababa as part of Project ARM. This invite-only meeting is taking place prior to the 16th International Conference on AIDS and STIs in Africa (ICASA, December 4–8), and is considered an official satellite session.

PLEASE NOTE: This is a working meeting—not a workshop, nor a conference.

The objectives of the December working meeting are:

• To promote a common understanding of how rectal microbicide (RM) research and advocacy is proceeding, the potential role that African RM research and advocacy could play, and the various African contexts within which RMs would be introduced.
• To enhance the capacity of African community advocates to participate in RM agenda-setting, research and mobilisation efforts.
• To stimulate strategies for African community mobilization around RMs; to put RMs on the research agenda in Africa; and, to develop an African RM research agenda that is part of a global RM research agenda.

AIMS OF THE SCHOLARSHIP PROGRAMME 

1. To strengthen research literacy and advocacy capacity amongst IRMA membership in Africa
2. To promote and enhance the role and standing of IRMA within the microbicide community in Africa
3. To facilitate the involvement of well-informed and active members of the African research and advocacy communities in the development of an African rectal microbicides agenda
4. To ensure diversity in participation at the meeting, including from researchers and community members, women and men, gay men and other men who have sex with men, people living with HIV, and different regions of Africa

We are covering the travel costs of more than 30 of the 40 meeting participants—most of which are Africans—including speakers, organisers, invited guests, and key partners. This includes an additional 12 scholarships for Africans through this call for applications.

For more information, please send an email to rectalmicro@gmail.com.

[If an item is not written by an IRMA member, it should not be construed that IRMA has taken a position on the article's content, whether in support or in opposition.]

Get inspired by Kadiri and help an IRMA advocate attend Microbicides 2010

Will you chip in?

TODAY - thanks to the generosity of the Elton John AIDS Foundation, and IRMA members, we already have $3,485 in our John Shaw Memorial Scholarship Fund to help support IRMA advocates attend the Microbicides 2010 conference coming up in Pittsburgh, May 2010.

We would like to bring that total to $10,000 - so we can help as many people as possible attend this important conference - and here is where you come in.

To donate to the John Shaw Memorial Scholarship fund, you may do so securely right here on this blog. In the upper left hand corner, there is a Chip In! box (just like the one right in this post) that allows you to donate whatever amount you would like via PayPal - securely.

The planners of M2010 are providing a large number of scholarships – so IRMA plans to fill in the gaps for rectal microbicide advocates who were unable to secure that support. We plan to release information on IRMA’s competitive scholarship process in early January 2009. Microbicides 2010 will be announcing their scholarships on February 1 – and IRMA will announce recipients of our support by March 1, 2010. IRMA scholarship recipients are required to have applied for M2010 support to be considered.

IRMA created the John Shaw Memorial Scholarship Fund in late 2007. John was a valued, enthusiastic and delightful member of the IRMA Steering Committee for over a year. He passed away Thursday, September 27, 2007. An LGBTQ/human rights advocate for over 20 years, John was also a Person With AIDS since at least 1990.

His fund helped rectal microbicide advocates attend the M2008 conference in New Delhi. Click here for a list of scholarship recipients, including Kadiri Audu of IRMA Nigeria, who went on to become Community Vice Chair of IRMA's Steering Commitee. He wrote about his Delhi/Microbicides 2008 conference for the IRMA blog - which we have republished below.

We hope he will inspire you to chip in - anything at all helps!

----------------------

Correspondence from IRMA advocates
by way of India

M2008 memories and the path forward

Taking rectal microbicide advocacy
to the next level in Lagos

by Kadiri Audu, Lagos. Nigeria
[read Kadiri's bio]

First, I want to thank the organizers of Microbicides 2008, IRMA, AIDS Foundation of Chicago and the John Shaw Memorial Scholarship fund that gave me the opportunity to attend the M2008 in New Delhi.

New Delhi is beautiful and the weather was just alright. I do not know if there is any better place to have hosted the conference in India, the conference was exciting and wonderful. It was interesting to have met new advocates from other parts of the world, and it was also interesting to know that people from the developed world like the USA and Canada are actually leading the research on rectal microbicides. Also, the Advocates Corner was a splendid idea because it gave the John Shaw Scholarship recipients, new advocates, and other IRMA members the chance to meet one another and build networking links among ourselves. My favorite memory was the chance to meet other advocates and the dinner organized for the conference participants.

I have been sharing my experience of the conference with members of the various networks that I belong to in our meetings. In addition to sharing my experience, I also share some materials that I collected at the advocates corner, i.e. stickers, pens and posters carrying the message about the conference.

In taking rectal microbicide advocacy to the next level, we have already formed Lagos IRMA, the aim is to mobilize more advocates in line with IRMA research and activities. We have even started e-mailing in that regards - our email address is lagosirma@yahoo.com, myself and Abdullrahaman formed it. He is also a new advocate that attended the conference and we operate from the same city. As of today we have 21 new members from our community.

Presently we are looking at reaching out to more people and groups like the youth leaders, the artisan groups like the hair dressers association, barbers association, the auto mechanic association, etc within our locality.

I would also like to suggest that we have training opportunities for us and our new members so as to be able to carry on the work effectively.

Thanks once again.
Kadiri Audu E

Send an IRMA Advocate to Pittsburgh!

Will you chip in?

by Roy Wadia, IRMA Steering Committee Member

I was one of the lucky recipients of the first round of John Shaw scholarships, to attend Microbicides 2008 in New Delhi. I'd been with IRMA (the former IRMWG) for a while by that time, and while I'd done a lot of HIV/AIDS advocacy and communications work during my time at WHO China and then at the BC CDC in Canada, I'd never really focused on microbicide issues until my introduction to this amazing group.

The more I delved into the subject matter, which initially seemed rather arcane, the more I realized its importance in the global response to the prevention and control of HIV/AIDS and STI. By focusing on rectal microbicides, an issue linked directly to the need to focus on anal sex and its role in the HIV/AIDS picture -- and yet one that is still not widely discussed or given its due in both scientific and advocacy circles -- IRMA and its membership has helped fill a conspicuous gap, prodding scientists, researchers and advocates alike.

The Delhi conference itself was an amazing chance to network, to meet some extraordinary individuals, and to experience that rather wonderful and long-overdue moment when the health minister of India, the conference host country, mentioned rectal microbicides as a weapon in the (if you'll pardon the unfortunate pun) arsenal to fight HIV/AIDS. It brought home the work that IRMA had been doing, and renewed our sense of mission and purpose. For this scholarship recipient it vindicated the work that's being done by so many of us, and I can only say that the John Shaw scholarship (named after a fearless advocate and lovely man) needs to continue and to be strengthened in the years to come.

-------------

IRMA created the John Shaw Memorial Scholarship Fund in late 2007. John was a valued, enthusiastic and delightful member of the IRMA Steering Committee for over a year. He passed away Thursday, September 27, 2007. An LGBTQ/human rights advocate for over 20 years, John was also a Person With AIDS since at least 1990.

His fund helped rectal microbicide advocates attend the M2008 conference in New Delhi. Click here for a list of scholarship recipients.

TODAY - thanks to the generosity of the Elton John AIDS Foundation, we already have $3,000 in the Fund to help support IRMA advocates to attend the Microbicides 2010 conference this coming May in Pittsburgh.

We would like to bring that total to $10,000 - and here is where you come in. Will you chip in to help a rectal microbicide advocate attend M2010?

To donate to the John Shaw Memorial Scholarship fund, you may do so securely right here on this blog. In the upper left hand corner, there is a Chip In! box that allows you to donate whatever amount you would like via PayPal - securely.

The planners of M2010 are providing a large number of scholarships – so IRMA plans to fill in the gaps for rectal microbicide advocates who were unable to secure that support. We plan to release information on IRMA’s competitive scholarship process in December 2009. Microbicides 2010 will be announcing their scholarships on February 1 – and IRMA will announce recipients of our support by March 1, 2010. IRMA scholarship recipients are required to have applied for M2010 support to be considered.

Thank you for your support!