Number Of Teachers In Training Drops, World AIDS Day, Evergleam Trees

Air Date:
Heard On Central Time

Veronica Rueckert and Rob Ferrett talk to a guest from UW-Madison’s School of Education about what could be causing the number of teachers in training there to decrease. Then they talk to several experts about World AIDS Day and learn about evergleam Christmas trees, which were made in Wisconsin.

Featured in this Show

  • This Year's World AIDS Day Focused On Helping Adolescents

    This year’s World AIDS Day, which occurred Sunday, Dec. 1, brought global attention to the sharp increase of AIDS-related deaths among adolescents.

    From 2005 to 2012, the number of AIDS-related deaths among people ages 10 to 19 doubled, while that number decreased by 30 percent for the general population during the same period. As a result, the World Health Organization (WHO) has released a new set of guidelines for addressing the needs of adolescents who are living with HIV and those who at risk of becoming infected.

    According to Susan Kasedde, senior specialist in adolescent HIV at the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), “Adolescents are not very well attended to within the existing health services.” Part of the problem, she said is that “adolescents are expected to be healthy” and therefore “they fall through the cracks.”

    One of the major obstacles to treating teens with HIV is that in many parts of the world, access to HIV testing for that age group is limited. Kasedde said there are “restrictions from a legal or policy standpoint in terms of (parental) consent for services including HIV testing and counseling.”

    Kasedde also noted that young people might not have access to quality information about the risk of HIV to begin with. As a result of a lack of testing and information, “the vast majority of adolescents living with HIV do not know their status.” Without that knowledge, they “may not come into services until it’s too late,” said Kasedde.

    When it comes to reducing the number of AIDS-related deaths, Kasedde said she is optimistic.

    “We are at a very unique time in the global AIDS response in that we have a very, very strong understanding of what services can reduce the risk of HIV transmission,” she said.

    The issue now is to “improve the planning of those services so that they are available to adolescents,” she said.

    In order to get there, Kasedde said that those fighting the pandemic need to focus on “working with schools … working with adolescents themselves, and really working with people in the community who work as gatekeepers to the adolescents.”

    When it comes to the question of stigma surrounding HIV status and sexuality, Kasedde said she likewise remains optimistic.

    “The one thing that we share regardless of culture is our value and our attachment to the ideal of healthy children,” she said.

    Since 1988, Dec. 1 has been a day dedicated to raising awareness about the AIDS pandemic caused by the spread of HIV.

  • Number Of Teachers In Training In UW System Drops

    State data show the number of junior and senior undergraduates enrolled in UW System teacher-training programs has dropped. The Associate Dean of Teacher Education at UW-Madison’s School of Education discusses this decrease and what could be behind it.

  • Talking About Adolescents With HIV On World AIDS Days

    World AIDS Day is December 1st. A new report from UNICEF shows that from 2005 to 2012 AIDS-related deaths among adolescents from ages 10 to 19 have gone up by 50 percent.

  • Wisconsin Life: Evergleam Trees

    Aluminum Christmas trees were a big hit in the 1960’s, and many of them came from Manitowoc. Our guest is the curator of an exhibit of these “evergleam” Christmas trees, and he explains the history of the novelties and their Wisconsin heritage.

Episode Credits

  • Rob Ferrett Host
  • Veronica Rueckert Host
  • Susan Kasedde Guest
  • Cheryl Hanley-Maxwell Guest
  • Joseph Kapler Guest
  • Amanda Magnus Producer
  • Galen Druke Producer