Student rally educates students on breast cancer basics

October is National Breast Cancer Awareness Month, and it’s important to be educated about common facts and ways to do self-exams. On Tuesday, Colleges Against Cancer at UCLA held its annual Breast Cancer Awareness Rally in Bruin Plaza, and we learn about the different activities the organization uses to get people’s attention and spread awareness about this disease.

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TRANSCRIPT:

RANDOLPH: PINK is the color of October – it’s National Breast Cancer Awareness Month. Many people know this but rarely learn and practice the ways to actually test themselves for breast cancer. UCLA Colleges Against Cancer prides itself in hosting cancer rallies throughout the year. On Tuesday, they held their annual Breast Cancer Awareness Rally, where booths were set up with games and educational materials for students to take part in.
One of the games present was Bra-Pong, where participants throw a ping pong ball into the cup of a bra. Before each chance, a Colleges  Against Cancer representative quizzes the player on breast cancer facts.
Students also have the opportunity to feel a silicon breast to learn the proper way to feel for lumps. They also have playful posters that say things like “Don’t be a noob, check your boob!” These games and signs might seem a little light-hearted, but UCLA Colleges Against Cancer President and fourth-year human biology and society student Sogol Ashrafian explains how they ensure that students have fun while learning important information.

ASHRAFIAN: The whole thing that we do at rallies is that we have all of these activities and fun signs to try and attract people to our table. But once we get you here and playing the games, that’s when we attack you with facts and information, so that we can actually educate. That is the point of our rally; we are trying to spread the education and awareness out there. It is important, and we want to talk to them about breast cancer and about what they should be doing right now as college students to stay protected.

RANDOLPH: Joyce Seldon, a genetic counselor at the UCLA Jonsson Comprehensive Cancer Center advises us that it is important that everyone becomes educated in order to catch the disease early on.

SELDON: Every woman should be aware of the risk. I also want to mention that even though I’ve been talking a lot about family history, breast cancer is common, so it’s important even if you don’t have a family history to be aware that there is a risk for it, just in the general population.

RANDOLPH: Fourth-year mathematics/economics student Bonnie Xu stopped by the booth on her way to class. She was interested in the activities because she recently found out that her mother was diagnosed with breast cancer. Xu shares with us how attending the breast cancer awareness rally here at UCLA gave her a sense of optimism.

XU: I saw this pink booth, and I saw this big breast cancer sign. My mom was diagnosed just last week with Stage 2 invasive ductal carcinoma. And so seeing this sign was very optimistic for me, just because raising awareness about this cancer. And I think it’s very important that people know to take their exams and I think I had this perspective that you don’t get breast cancer unless it runs in your family, and so it doesn’t run in my family, and it just came out of nowhere, so I think it’s very important to raise awareness for other women to get checked regularly because you never know if you’re gonna get it or not.

RANDOLPH: One in eight women will be diagnosed with breast cancer in her lifetime. To help your chances and to catch it early, Seldon suggests you get educated, and start giving yourself self-breast exams on a monthly basis.
For Daily Bruin Radio, I’m Dustin Randolph.