Media representatives are invited to an orientation for 14 summer interns from across the nation as well as from Nigeria and Denmark who have come to North Carolina to work with American Indian communities on community-led health projects. These five-week Health Justice Internships are a project of the Native Health Initiative, created in 2004 as a partnership between the state’s American Indian communities and health professions students at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill to address health inequities using “loving service.”
Saturday and Sunday (June 21 and June 22)
10 a.m. to 4 p.m.
Burnt Swamp Association/Healing Lodge
400 Prospect Road, Pembroke
During this two-day orientation, Health Justice Internship volunteers will visit with many leaders in the Pembroke area and hear from American Indian youth working to promote smoking prevention/cessation in their communities. NHI’s community coordinators – former Miss Indian North Carolina Brittany Simmons (Waccamaw-Siouan), Mark Deese (Tuscarora), Vivette Jeffries-Logan (Occaneechi) and Reverend Bruce Swett (Lumbee) –will also lead activities with the students, preparing them to begin their five-week internships in various communities around the state.
Note: The media is welcome anytime during the orientation, but please contact Cheryl Boone (ceboone@email.unc.edu) or Shannon Fleg (919-260-3861) in advance if you plan to attend.
This initiative is a partnership between students and American Indian communities that addresses inequities in health through loving service. It is the only such community-student partnership in the United States, and its Health Justice Internships are also unique in being the only program to bring students from abroad to serve and learn about health inequities in American Indian communities here. Most importantly, the initiative uses “loving service” as its primary funding source, achieving a wide array of programs and partnerships on a very small budget. In its first four years, the program has generated more than 25,000 hours of loving service, volunteered by students, tribal leaders, community members and many partner organizations.
The initiative operates under the auspices of UNC’s Student Health Action Coalition and nationally in cooperation with the American Medical Student Association and the Association of Clinicians for the Underserved. In 2007, the program received an Office of the Provost Engaged Scholarship Award from UNC’s Carolina Center for Public Service for its demonstration of exemplary engaged scholarship (the application of university expertise to address community needs) in service to the state of North Carolina.
Native Health Initiative Web site: http://www.unc.edu/~flega/
Native Health Initiative contact: Shannon Fleg, (919) 260-3861
News Services contact: Susan Houston, (919) 962-8415, susan_houston@unc.edu