Conscious Contraceptives was on ASU’s Tempe campus Tuesday, passing out condoms and fliers promoting their worldwide mission for safe sex.
Along with its partners from Support for International Change, the organization has been traveling to universities across the country to spread its message.
“We’re taking more of a grassroots approach,” founder Cory Capoccia said. “The whole goal of this is to really connect with the student population, being one of our target demographics.”
ConCon is a globally conscious company that provides customers and those in need with contraceptives, the 27-year-old UCLA grad said. It officially launched Dec. 1, 2011, to coincide with World AIDS Day. Its motto: “Do good while feeling good.”
Support for International Change, a nonprofit, works to limit the impact of HIV/AIDS in underserved communities in Africa such as Tanzania, said Lindsay Whiddon, SIC executive director.
SIC offers HIV/AIDS education, treatment, counseling and testing services.
With ConCon providing an easy and discreet way to purchase condoms and other sexual-health products online, its partnership with SIC makes sense.
Finding inspiration in TOMS Shoes’ “one for one” program, a portion of every ConCon sale goes toward contraceptives donations in underprivileged areas around the world, Capoccia said.
“We’re not only going to channel those funds to purchase donated items but through our partnership [with SIC] we’re able to actually help empower them to continue to really work on the ground in Tanzania and hopefully expand their mission outside of Tanzania as well,” he said.
That work includes sexual health and sexual education abroad.
“Not only the physical product but they go above and beyond,” Capoccia said.
SIC volunteers come from all over to work in Africa, like Stanford University biology senior Caroline Smith. She has been with SIC for over two years and serves as an operations manager, she said in a phone interview.
Smith, a pre-med student, is interested in global health and found out about SIC’s work through a friend.
“SIC exposes you to so much more than just [volunteering] in the U.S.,” she said. Smith had the opportunity to spend a summer in rural Tanzania teaching HIV/AIDS awareness in 2009.
Today, working alongside Whiddon, Smith manages the 13 universities involved in the program.
“We have chapters at universities across the nation, ASU being one of them,” Whiddon said. Though the ASU chapter has not been very active the last couple of years, Whiddon remains optimistic.
“I’m really excited about this partnership, I really would love to have more ASU participation,” she said.
Contact the reporter at maxfield.barker@asu.edu
