AIDS Outreach Group Hopes To Dispense Condoms to Yard

AIDS Education and Outreach (AEO) members continued their survey on condom distribution on campus yesterday with high hopes that the results will help them convince the Freshman Dean's Office (FDO) to add condom distribution boxes to first-year dorms.

AEO has been installing condom boxes in Houses since January, after all House masters agreed. The FDO, however, did not allow a similar distribution program in the Yard.

"The freshman deans were a little more reluctant," said AEO co-chair David Chao '99. "They wanted to see how the program went in the Houses before they put the same program in the Yard."

The survey, which will continue after spring break, asked House residents whether they were satisfied with condom distribution in their Houses, and asked first-years whether they would like to see a similar program in the Yard.

According to Chao, 91 percent of first-years surveyed Wednesday said they would like to see a similar program in the Yard. Chao said he hopes these results will sway the FDO toward allowing more box installations.

The FDO "said they would support the program if it went well in the Houses and there was enough support from the freshmen," he said. "Hopefully we'll have them in the Yard by next semester."

AEO members said condom boxes in central locations would make it easier for first-year students to have safer sex.

"We want to put boxes into...the dorms that have a central area, like a laundry room, in discrete locations," said AEO member Jorge A. Alvarez '01.

But according to Dean of Freshmen Elizabeth S. Nathans, the FDO does not always have the right to authorize such installations.

"The FDO doesn't have access to all the basements in the Yard, and there are not laundry/recycling rooms in all basements," she wrote in an e-mail message.

But Nathans added that the FDO is willing to look for appropriate spots.

"We were happy to discuss placement of condom machines in certain areas of the first year dorms to which we do have access," she said.