The Dave Matthews Band indirectly donated $10,000 in January to the University's Teen Health Center Education program, a gift that will help keep the program available to all schools in the Albemarle area.
"We applied to the [BAMA Works] program in August and we found out about the grant in December," said Dyan Aretakis, Teen Health Center project director.
The Center asked BAMA Works, a charity fund for the Charlottesville-Albemarle area founded by the band, for $10,000 in grant money, which they received in January.
"We are very happy to receive that money," Aretakis said. "It should last for two years. When this money is up, we will look around for more money."
Last year, the teen health center program was shut down because of a lack of funds in all but one of the schools in which it had been implemented. The program only remained operational at St. Anne's Bellfield, a local private school.
"The money that was donated will go toward paying for the coordinator and buying books, videos and pamphlets," Aretakis said.
The teen center promotes peer education, which is considered a novel way to educate people on health issues, Aretakis said.
Volunteer teens train with the center to talk with other teens about contemporary problems. They teach on issues such as eating disorders, body image, alcohol and drug use and sexually transmitted infections.
"Forty kids have gone through the program over the last three years," Aretakis said.
Students of Charlottesville and Albemarle High schools volunteer at the center.
BAMA Works is facilitated by the Charlottesville-Albemarle Community Foundation, which divides funds provided to BAMA Works by the band and distributes them to area non-profit programs that apply for grants.
John Redick, executive director of the foundation, reviews applications from non-profit organizations then sends the applications he approves to a review committee. The review committee consists of 10 local residents who remain anonymous. After the committee approves the applications, they are sent to the band, who makes the final decisions.
"They want to remain anonymous so they won't be lobbied," Redick said.
The band donates a portion of the proceeds from their tours each year to the BAMA Works fund.
"The amount of money in the fund varies from year-to-year depending on how their tour does," Redick said. "There is slightly less than three million dollars in the fund now."
Ben and Jerry's Ice Cream also donates a portion of the money acquired from the sale of a flavor of ice cream called "one sweet whirled." The flavor's name is based off the band's song entitled "One Sweet World."
The mission of the Center, which was founded in 1991, is to provide a basic health care service to teens in the Charlottesville-Albemarle area. Services include sports physicals, prenatal care and family planning, asthma evaluation and management, and obesity assessment and treatment.
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