Shame shame - STD defamation website makes it personal

When a person gets diagnosed with an STD, its courtesy to contact current and former partners and let them know. This way they can take care of themselves too and everyone is happier. If it sounds scary there are systems in place to help you, like the STD division of your local public health department or inSPOT.org. These systems have been built with yours and your partners' privacy in mind.

So...I wasn't too happy this morning when I saw this article thud into my inbox. Put out by Citizen-Times.com, the article titled "Web site lists people with STDs -- Whether they have them or not," made me super grumpy. The site professes to be an international list of people with STDs. And anyone can post an addition to the site, regardless of truth. And yes, there is a list of names, complete with city, state, age and gender.

But, slow down a second. What if it is true? Isn't that person owed the same courtesy they just showed their partner by telling them in confidence? Don't we want to be reinforcing the habit of privately sharing this information with those who need to know because their health depends on it? Can't the response simply be, "Thank you for telling me. I'll get tested."

So what can we do here? Public humiliation is obviously going to dig us deeper in the wrong direction.

1. If you are sexually active make testing regularly part of your routine. Go with a friend if that helps. In California you can text your zipcode + CLINIC to 365247 for a testing site near you. Or get online and tap into the HIVtest.org database that includes both STD and HIV testing resources nationally. In San Francisco, STDtest.org provides a private, cheap way to test, with results securely accessed online by a unique identifier.

2. Share your results with your partner(s) and inquire about theirs. Build trust and sleep easier. Need help figuring out what to say? That's normal. Here's a guide.

3. Learn about the STDs and how they are transmitted, treated and prevented. Inspot.org has easily digestible information as does SF City Clinic.

Global Youth Demand Action

Where were you 15 years ago? Maybe you were already working or looking for work, maybe you were in college or grade school, maybe you weren't even born yet.

But officials from 179 countries got together in Cairo, Egypt, in the fall of 1994 and promised to change the world in 20 years. The result of the International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) was a ambitious plan that would, among other benefits, give universal access to services and information to improve the sexual and reproductive health of everyone by 2015.

Fast forward to today, with just over five years to go, and we have a lot of work to do.

Using technology that was just a glimmer in some developers' eyes 15 years ago, young people around the world are taking their sexual health and their future in their own hands. Earlier this month, the International Planned Parenthood Federation (IPPF) launched the 15andCounting campaign on social networking platforms MXit, Facebook and Twitter - urging young people around the world to call their governments to task and demand action.

According to the campaign, "too many governments have failed to make good on their promises. This failure puts the lives and health of tens-of-millions of young people at risk." To put this in context, those born in 1994 form part of the largest group of young people the world has ever seen – some 1.5 billion. With these numbers, as I'm sure we all know, their health and wellbeing affects all of us.

Toward this end, the campaign offers a petition that will be presented to the United Nations to demand governments act now to "fulfill their promise to provide better access to sexual and reproductive health services for all young people."

More than 25,000 people from around the world have signed it so far, mostly young people. The campaign has a goal of "hundreds of thousands of signatures representing every country on the planet."

From their website: "We are asking all governments around the world to prioritise [sic] young people’s sexual and reproductive health and rights, including comprehensive sex education and information and youth friendly health services."

For more information, check out these links:

15andcounting
Join 15andcounting on Facebook
Follow 15andcounting on Twitter

Job Open at ISIS

Hey folks, ISIS is looking for a Director of Finance and Administration. See job description below. If you're qualified, we'd love to have you on board.

The Director of Finance and Administration will oversee all administrative and grant-related functions in the Organization. This position is located in downtown Oakland and reports directly to the Executive Director. ISIS offers a casual and pleasant work environment and generous benefits.

Responsibilities Include:

· Creating and managing short- and long-term budgets; financial planning, annual projected budgets and generating budget reports

· Preparing financial reports and working with accountant on taxes and audits

· Working with Executive Director to develop organization-wide policies, procedures and systems

• Working with Executive Director to set long-term strategic goals and align development efforts with overall goals; supporting Executive Director in all financial efforts, including grants, contracts, and donations.

· Work with Board of Directors on budget and strategic planning projects

· Managing development; overseeing work in grants, contracts and donations

· Ensuring compliance with all aspects, including reporting and invoicing requirements, of grants/contracts. Keeping current on changes to reporting requirements of all funding sources.

· Supervising human resources and finance

· Working with bookkeeper to ensure that invoices are completed accurately and on time and to correctly align income and expenses with the appropriate funding sources.

· Managing payroll and employee benefits, including 403(b)

· Identifying and working with vendors responsible for office equipment and supplies, IT, phones, etc. Negotiating contracts with vendors.

· Managing relationships with all office-related vendors including the landlord and office supply companies.

· Maintaining office supply inventory.

Qualifications and Requirements Include:

• 10+ years of senior level administration, finance, grant, and program management experience
• Bachelor's Degree in finance, business or non-profit administration, MBA preferred
• Solid short- and long-term budget planning experience
• Strong strategic thinking and planning skills
• Solid leadership and staff and vendor management experience
• Meticulous attention to detail
• Outstanding organizational skills
• Strong time- and project-management skills. Must be able to meet multiple deadlines with strict and tight timetables.
• Ability to work both independently and with limited supervision.
• Flexible and hard-working
• Strong analytical skills.
• Excellent communication skills, including strong business writing skills.
• Outstanding computer skills, including Microsoft Word, Excel, Powerpoint, and donor database systems.
• Comfortable with sexual health content.

Please submit your resume and cover letter with compensation requirements to: jobs@isis-inc.org

No phone calls, faxes, or in-person applications please.

Local candidates only.

ISIS-Inc. is an equal opportunity employer.

<3 Sex::Tech Doodles

Lloyd Dangle, the illustrator behind the packaging for Airborne and the San Francisco Bay Guardian weekly comic strip Troubletown, rocked Sex::Tech with caricatures and artistic interpretations of our speakers and their sessions.

We suggest you watch the video of the sessions here, then compare our speakers' likenesses to the doodles here. And and and, don’t forget to follow us on Twitter and that Sex::Tech presentations are available to download!

Sex::Tech 2009 Media Buffet

Sex::Tech 2009 was beyond superfragilisticexpiali- awesome! Really, it was and we have the video and photos to prove it. Head over to ISIS’ YouTube Channel and Flickr to get a taste of Buckworld One’s edgy, high energy performance.



You can also see what Dean Eckles from Nokia Research Innovate Design Experience Animate (IDEA) Team and Kevin Bertram of Distributive Networks said during the 2nd day keynote!

The presentations of our Sex::Tech attendees are also available for download here. We hope you enjoy all these tasty media morsels and REALLY hope you’ll come out for the next Sex::Tech! Don’t forget to add us on Twitter!

Sex::Tech 2009 was a roarin' success

Hello y'all!

We rocked the JW Marriott for two full days (Sunday/Monday, March 22nd/23rd) with the Sex::Tech 2009 Focus on Youth conference.

More than 400 attendees enjoyed an array of speakers from Rutgers, NYU, University of Colorado, UCLA, and that was just the researchers!

The "un-conference" was a huge success -- with about 15 different folks signing up to host informal one-hour discussions with their peers on the spot!

And talk about an opening plenary! BuckWorld One took it to a whole new level -- the street-cred dancers from Riverside County brought the attendees to their feet. The passion and professionalism they showed in their dance -- which spoke on themes of racism, misogyny, street violence, oppression and a lot of other social ills -- were really amazing. The crew left everyone invigorated for the rest of the conference.

You can check out Sex::Tech (click) for a sampling of what we all experienced and what you should make sure you get a chance to experience next year.

Blessings,

YPulse at SXSW - getting the lo-down on teen webbing

Hello y'all,

Well, we're at the eve of Sex::Tech 2009 and all I can say is wow! Kickin' off this Sunday, March 22nd at the J.W. Marriott in San Francisco, California we here at ISIS are truly ready to rock the house! For those of you who want to show up prepared, I offer you this bit of blog to enhance and enrich your Sex::Tech 2009 experience.

Our friends at YPulse, namely Anastasia, headed out to the SXSW festival in Austin, Texas last week to host a roundtable on "What Teens Want in a Website", and wrote about feedback from youth panelists. The youth talked about a bunch of topics, including the age old battle - MySpace versus Facebook, MS being for the "urban youth" and FB catering to "suburban youth". Turns out that neither of these social networking sites are all that "hot" right now, and that the youth have moved on to other, more relevant ways to social network via technology.

Which brought up the conversation about moving away from the computer screen and handlin' teen biz via texting, which has truly surpassed any of the social messaging networks. Teens get a phone, and wham-bam-thank you ma'am (ol' skool talk), it's On!! And these teens still text more than talk, remember talking??, which allows more privacy than MS/FB.

The panel also discussed brand sites, video, twitter, the whole mix of what y'all teens get yourselves involved in nowadays, when you have the spare time. It seems that all of these topics were of interest, but none of them really dominated the teen panel's time.

Overall, the article points out a few really good facts, based on the teen panel that is........teens are more interested in mobility than sitting in front of a computer screen. As far as being "techies" teens are workin' the text thing like mad, new tech is not something that these teens had a real passionate desire to explore.

Read all about it so that when you are sitting in the Sex::Tech workshops you'll be right on top of the dialogue and possibly add some of your own!

Enjoy the show and we all look forward to seeing you on Sunday.

Blessings!

Golden Gate Express Turning Up the Heat on Sex::Tech

Hello all,

The SEX::TECH 2009 conference is ON! And we've got none other than our good friends at San Francisco State University, Golden Gate Xpress newspaper writin' us up!

Check out this awesome interview with none other than ISIS' Youth Outreach & Marketing Coordinator, Margaret Lucas (and SFSU alum), keepin' it real about what to look for at the Conference. Definitely check out the article to see how youth and technology are shaping everything from health outreach strategies, to political campaigns!

We know you've heard tons about it and are excited to participate - so make sure you get down to the JW Marriott Hotel, 500 Post St., San Francisco (near Union Square) and make it happen!

We got straight from the inland empire, BuckWorld, rockin and krumpin' to open the show. It's gonna be off the chizzain!

Blessings for a beautiful weekend......