Dance competition gives back to IU/Kenya partnership

If the average annual income in Kenya is $300, imagine what $1,060.27 would mean to the people struggling with HIV and AIDS.

That was the amount raised in Willkie Auditorium on Saturday at the Kenya Dance program. The event was organized by two resident assistants from Collins LLC and benefited the IU/Kenya Partnership and the Sally Test Pediatric Center, which utilizes dance and the arts as a means of patient rehabilitation and therapy.

“This cause is extremely important to me,” said junior Traci Pettigrew, who organized the event. “I have been to Kenya twice. I care a lot about the people over there and especially the kids in the pediatric center. I know the need for a happy environment at the hospital.”

Kenya Dance featured performances by IU’s Ballroom Dance team, Gumboots Dance team, IU Breakdance club and InMotion Dance Company, as well as visiting performers from Village Dance Studio in Zionsville, Ind.

A 15-minute intermission followed the performances, during which audience members voted for their favorite act by donating money to each team’s designated bin. Voting was tallied based on the amount of money each team received.

InMotion Dance Company took first place, while the ballet ensemble from the Village Dance Company placed second and contemporary dance soloist Melissa Strain took third.

“We always try to participate in different student-run events,” said InMotion captain and IU senior Jillian McAfee. “We were excited to participate in an event that raises money for such a good cause.”

Pettigrew’s whole family has a strong investment in helping those infected with HIV/AIDS in Kenya. Her father Ron Pettigrew is Program Manager of IU/Kenya, and Annette Pettigrew, her mother, who owns the Village Dance Studio, has worked at the Sally Test Center teaching patients to dance.

The partnership was founded in 1989 between the IU School of Medicine in Indianapolis and Moi University School of Medicine in Eldoret, Kenya. Since 1990, IU has had a permanent full-time faculty member on site in Kenya.

“The idea was to establish a partnership with another institution to try to provide health care to a number of people and to develop health care professionals both in Kenya and the U.S.,” Ron Pettigrew said. 

Discrimination against HIV/AIDS victims is strong in Kenya, so another goal of the partnership is to help victims restore their well-being in a prejudiced society.

“People are unable to maintain their jobs because their employers don’t want them around, so we help them reestablish themselves, regain their dignity and their self-esteem and help them to provide for their families,” Ron Pettigrew said.

Annette Pettigrew pointed out the importance of dance and the arts to restore patients – especially children – to overall mental, physical and emotional health.  

“I taught creative movement there in the fall,” she said, “and even the doctors would come out and join in the activities. They wanted the children to get out of bed and to get up and moving. It’s good for them to find the beat of the music, to become totally integrated with their body, mind and spirit.”

The money from Kenya Dance will help buy supplies to maintain the partnership’s commitment to pediatric art therapy and to spread it outside the Sally Test Center. Clinics need not only things like art supplies, CD players and instruments but also necessities like batteries and extension cords. 

“When patients go out into the rural clinics, which are about 50 miles away or more, they have to wait on benches for hours to see doctors,” she said. “They sit for hours after having walked hours.”

Emcees Traci Pettigrew and Matt Ubrig, Collins resident assistants, helped organize the event and were met with applause when they asked the crowd if they would like to see Kenya Dance put on again in the future.  

“I am overwhelmed by the support from those who participated and those who came and gave donations,” Traci Pettigrew said. “I am more excited than ever to do it again next year and make it bigger and better to further the partnership between IU and the people in Kenya.”