Camp Kwizera: Empowering Youth to Lead Through Service

At FACE AIDS, our mission is to fight HIV/AIDS by building a global movement of youth dedicated to health equity and social justice. We combine innovation and passion in our commitment to deliver services and opportunities to those in need while also executing a broader agenda of social change. By engaging youth in direct action, awareness-raising, leadership development, and pragmatic solidarity, FACE AIDS is changing the way our generation thinks about HIV/AIDS. We focus on opportunities to make a meaningful difference and demonstrate that young people can, have, and must lead the fight for the eradication of HIV/AIDS and the promotion of global health equity. Though FACE AIDS typically engages young people at colleges and high schools, in 2009, we founded Camp Kwizera, a summer day camp for middle school students focused on leadership through service. We realized that unlike college and high school students, middle school students rarely have the opportunity to engage in meaningful service and interactive learning on compelling international issues. They are often the beneficiaries of service and educational programs, rather than the leaders. We seek to empower these students, enabling them to identify their passions and harness them for effective action. These students then move through high school and college knowing they have a community of like-minded peers, and are poised to pursue positions of global health and social justice leadership.