Within the offices of the Health Education Services at Olin Health Center, MSU senior Deanna DeHaven has been working for two years to help bring some MSU students peace of mind.
DeHaven is the recipient of the MSU Student Employee of the Year award as well as Michigan's Student Employee of the Year award for her work coordinating the HIV counseling program.
DeHaven, a social work and interdisciplinary health studies senior, coordinates Olin Health Center's HIV Education, Counseling and Testing program.
The program is a free and anonymous resource that students can turn to for HIV testing and counseling, DeHaven said.
While the results of those tests are important, she said, it's more crucial for students to have proper education on the disease and available support if the tests are positive.
"One of the questions we ask is, 'If the test is positive, how would it affect their life?'" she said. "On the flip side, we ask, 'If the test is negative, how would it affect their life?'"
One of her main goals has been to make the program's services and information about sexually transmitted diseases more accessible to students.
DeHaven currently is working to create new health information brochures to be distributed across campus.
"When you're talking about health, it changes all the time," she said. "When you're talking about STDs, it's even more essential to get accurate information."
Dennis Martell, a health educator at Olin Health Center, nominated DeHaven for the award. He said choosing her for the nomination was an easy decision.
"Where else can you ask a student to take on such a responsibility and have such commitment and professionalism?" Martell said. "It's more than adults can handle, let alone a full-time student."
Marshall Poole, a health educator in Olin Health Center, helped with the nomination and said he felt no one deserved the honor more than DeHaven.
"Over the last two years, she has taken control of the program and run with it," Poole said. "She's done an amazing job.
"She knows her stuff."
DeHaven said she never expected to be chosen for the honor at the university, let alone the state, level.
"It was a complete surprise," she said. "With senioritis setting in, it was good motivation."
