This Wednesday marked the 11th edition of the Peel District School Board's R U Aware Student Conference. The annual event stages workshops, presentations, group discussions and games. All are designed to provide facts about HIV/AIDS and sexually transmitted infections, as well as answer student questions and debunk myths.

Peel board partners with Peel Public Health and Peel HIV/AIDS Network (PHAN) to present the conference for high school students. About 130 students from across Peel attended the recent version at the board's central offices in Mississauga.

The conference has continued for more than a decade because the message, the issue and good health remain as relevant and important as when the event began, said Board Chair Janet McDougald.

These days HIV/AIDS is often viewed as the pandemic killing hundreds of thousands in Africa and the Third World. But the disease is a real threat that exists in Peel and Canada, McDougald said as she launched the conference. Awareness and education are key to protection, she added.

"The event focuses on HIV as a local issue and provides student leaders with tools to take action by raising awareness in their schools," McDougald said.

A vital component of the conference is encouraging teenagers to share what they learn at the event with others. Organizers try to give participants communications tools students can use to create their own school-based public education campaigns and events.

Students are expected to leave the conference with the faint outline of an action plan for spreading useful information in their schools.

According to statistics from the federal government, 15 to 19-year-olds accounted for 15 per cent of the 58,981 positive HIV tests recorded as of Dec. 31, 2006. More than 25 per cent of those infected people were aged 20 to 29. Half of all new HIV infections are in people aged 15 to 24-years-old.

Bhavan Sandhu, a Harold Brathwaite Secondary School student, and Sahil Kumar, a Cawthra Park Secondary School student, are the board's student trustees and advocates of the conference. Kumar attended the conference as a junior.

More teenagers are becoming sexually active, Sandhu believes, they need to be aware of the potential health risks.

Facts about HIV/AIDS and sexually transmitted infections are only discussed in an educational setting during Grade 9 health class, the students noted.

"How much do you really listen in Grade 9?" Sandhu remarked.

More information is available on the Peel Health Web site at www.peelregion.ca/health.