No Break for AIDS Activists : Health: Teens in Planned Parenthood program are among a number of youths working this summer to heighten awareness of the disease among their peers.

Not all teens at the beach next week will be there for the sun and surf.

Starting Monday, about a dozen youths working for Planned Parenthood this summer are scheduled to hit the sand armed with pamphlets and training materials in an attempt to educate peers about sex and AIDS.

The teens are part of Planned Parenthood’s annual beach outreach program, and they are among a number of youths who are working to bring more AIDS education into their schools and communities.

Included in that number are Emily Hobson, 17, a student representative to the Laguna Beach HIV Advisory Committee; Josh Corngold, 18, a Newport Harbor High School senior, who plans to write for the school newspaper editorial staff to continue a crusade for a better AIDS curriculum; and a 22-year-old North County community college student, known only as “Joe” who is an HIV-infected heterosexual and known to many for his talks about AIDS.

This summer, Joe is teaching teachers how to better educate students about AIDS in seminars at the Orange County Department of Education.

School may be out, but these young adults are not taking off for the summer.

“I think we have a responsibility now to be a loud voice in our communities,” said Danny MacArthur, 18, who graduated from Garden Grove’s Rancho Alamitos High School in June and is working as a beach counselor for Planned Parenthood this summer. “It’s up to the schools and it’s up to us. We’re the authority now.”

While some parents and administrators continue the sex education debate--how much to tell, how graphically to tell it, and how often it should be told--students are disseminating information themselves.

These young activists may not be typical of young adults, nor are they engaging in these tasks for the same reasons. A few are gay. One aspires to find a cure for AIDS, another wants to educate peers and there are those who simply need summer jobs.

Health educators and school administrators have mixed impressions about this latest twist in campus activism, ranging from offering support to to expressing fear that these activists may be spreading misinformation.

Most school officials feel confident about their existing AIDS programs, and new state legislation taking effect this fall mandates that an AIDS course be taught once in junior high and again in high school.

“In some cases, they’re not accurate. We are doing more than they perceive,” said Robert Francy, director of student services at Newport-Mesa Unified School District. “We’re trying to catch up. I think everybody is. Society, generally speaking, and education have not picked up on this crisis quickly enough and provided enough information.”

According to a health department study released in February, there have been 2,002 reported AIDS cases in Orange County since 1981, and about 60% of those people have died. Of the total, just four were between the ages of 13 and 19. But that number increases dramatically for those between the ages of 20 and 29, where there have been 391 cases, or 20% of all reported cases in the county.

Last spring, Carmin Laurens, 17, a senior at Estancia High School in Costa Mesa and one of the few youth members of ACT UP, became something of a mentor among young activists when she won permission from the school to hold a sex and AIDS education assembly for her peers. However, without the school’s permission, she brought ACT UP to Estancia last April for an early-morning condom distribution.

“I think it’s probably a wake-up call for us. If there’s a student who thinks we’re not doing enough, maybe we better re-examine what we’re doing,” said Frank Infusino, principal at Estancia. “I’m not sure passing out condoms to a 14-year-old is sex education.”

Susan Sullivan, a senior public health nurse with the County Health Care Agency, singled out the efforts of student activists at Tustin’s Foothill High School. The students drew the attention of a national television show in a recently aired segment on AIDS in Orange County.

“I think you have young people who are really concerned about themselves and about their friends,” Sullivan said.

But Sullivan warns that the recent surge of these youth efforts need a guiding hand. “It’s a wonderful concept, but in order to do it justice, we really need to have programs that are well-funded and well-supervised.”

Of a dozen youths recently finishing a weeklong training session for their summer jobs at Planned Parenthood, nearly all agreed that they weren’t getting enough information at school.

“I think it’s just the beginning for us,” said Yadira Aceves, 16, a senior at Saddleback High School in Santa Ana and a summer Planned Parenthood worker.