November Event - Get Familiar Mixer

On Wednesday November 28^th, the Students for Women's issues group held an event called the “Get Familiar Mixer.” The members of SWI labeled this event as a mock party when they first advertized it to the student body. When you first walked into the glass dining room area to the right of Java City, no one had any idea what to expect. Members gave out a white note card with a small shape in red on the upper right hand corner and prompted students to take a seat anywhere. When everyone was settled in their seats, SWI Vice President Jazmyn Jones made introductions about the group and then gave instructions about what everyone was going to do. Participants were to get up and introduce themselves to people they didn't know and they were to trade the shapes that they had written on their card. For example if Joe had an 'X' shape and Jane had a 'Star' shape, Joe would write a 'Star' on his note card and Jane would write an 'X' on hers. Everyone mingled and traded shapes for 15 minutes, talking happily, shaking hands, and briefly getting to know each other. When everyone was settled in their seats again, the SWI members lined up in front of the room with large note cards.

“Raise your hand if you have a smiley face...” Erin Hickey, Treasurer, asked the group. When hands went up she said “Well you all now have AIDS.” Everyone in the room laughed but Hickey went on, “The reality of the exercise we just did is that STDS like AIDS or HIV can spread easily from person to person and can be undetected.” Each member of SWI read off a piece of information that had polls taken on campus involving safe sex, STD awareness, and pregnancy/STD prevention services that are available on campus. “96% of students said that they do not use a condom every time they have sex, while the remaining 4% said they use a condom every time,” explained Senior, Tajah Gloster.. Like this piece of information, the results from every single poll was jaw dropping. “We hold events like this to show the Frostburg community how uneducated and careless people can be when it comes to sex,” exclaimed SWI President Jenaee McWhirter, “We want to share this information so that the next time you attend a party or any kind of social gathering, you will thing before you act.”

The event was short, only going from 8 to 8:30, but many students with with a different outlook on their decision making process. Thanks to SWI, the small group of people who attended this event are a little more educated than they were before and they may go on to educate others.