College Week, Day 4: Spotlight on University of South Carolina
It’s College Week on Bedsider’s social channels, a chance to highlight the efforts of our amazing campus ambassadors. Today’s “College Week spotlight” is on the super-saucy and creative team at the University of South Carolina. This interview was conducted by their friends at BedsiderATX, with answers provided by Bedsider ambassador Cayla Spear.
A fierce model struts the runway in a dress made entirely of condoms.
Q. What advice would you give the next generation of campus ambassadors?
A. Make sure to make friends with other organizations around campus. There are so many different interest groups at every school and there are plenty that will love to work with Bedsider. We ran events with The Feminist Majority League and SWARM, and many others have expressed interest. Also, never be afraid to mention Bedsider at random school events. For example, USC had a formal showing of the election results last November…and Bedsider postcards may have been mysteriously passed out among the guests.
Q. What has been your favorite event this year or semester?
A. Project Condom, hands down. We made an awesome dress out of duct tape and a couple hundred pink and gold condoms, and we won third place! We also had some fantastic volunteers, a wonderful model, and plenty of help.
Q. How has working on the Bedsider campus ambassador program changed your outlook on sex, relationships, and life?
A. Well, I grew up in the conservative South where people aren’t too keen to talk about anything that has to do with sex. Working with the ambassador program has really made me realize that women and men do want to talk about sex and birth control, but some just don’t know how to. So I’ve definitely begun to talk a lot more about sex and birth control with everyone that I speak to. Instead of talking about sex like it’s a dirty little secret, I’ve come to see it and think of it as part of relationships and life.
Q. What is the craziest thing you have done at a Bedsider event?
A. I’d have to say making our condom dress. There’s just something crazy about having to unroll, cut and shred condoms, and then rubber cement them onto duct tape.
Q. What is the most awkward/embarrassing question someone has asked you at a Bedsider event?
A. I had someone ask me what they should do if their partner’s penis was too big for a condom. I was pretty surprised by the question, but luckily Bedsider has an awesome video.
College Week, Day 2: Bedsider ambassadors don’t give up on sex, birth control, or baking.
It’s College Week at Bedsider, a chance to highlight the efforts of our amazing campus ambassadors. Today’s “College Week spotlight” is on the always-spunky, super-enthusiastic, basically unstoppable University of Maryland (UMD) ambassadors. We knew our ambassadors were doing incredible things in the name of birth control education, but UMD’s Connor Davies took it to a new, delicious level by making…wait for it…birth control truffles.
Birth control truffles: Harder to make than you’d think.
When I first read the Bedsider slogan “You didn’t give up on sex, don’t give up on birth control,” I never thought that something as easy as birth control would need that much effort. That was until I tried to make birth control-themed candy and I thought about giving up around 30,076,431 times within the span of two days.
It all started on Pinterest, with a spark of inspiration. I could just see it—perfect chocolate-covered truffles dyed to match the color of birth control pills and arranged perfectly on a tray surrounded by strawberry lemonade to be devoured by knowledge-hungry Bedsider-event-goers.
Lemonade, the finishing touch.
Ingredients
- sugar cookie dough (pre-made or from scratch)
- 1 lemon
- 2 limes
- 12 oz of cream cheese at room temperature
- 2 bags of white chocolate chips
- food coloring (optional)
Directions
- Make sugar cookie mix according to the instructions (mine called for a stick of softened butter and 1 egg). Add in the juice of 1 lemon and 2 limes along with the zest.
- Spread cookie dough out in one flat sheet on a cookie sheet and bake until firm and just golden on top (I cooked mine at 350 degrees for 20 minutes).
- Take out cookie dough and let cool completely.
- Once cooled, break into small chunks and combine in stand mixer (or with hand mixer) with cream cheese.
- Roll cookie and cream cheese mixture into balls around 1/2 inch in diameter and let cool and firm in the freezer for 2 hours.
- After 2 hours, melt white chocolate chips in a double boiler or microwave (for best results follow the instructions on the back of your chocolate package)—the addition of 2-3 drops of food coloring will get that nice birth-control-pill color.
- Take frozen cookie balls out of the freezer and with a toothpick dip in chocolate leaving toothpick in to harden. After all truffles are dipped, return to the freezer to harden.
This all sounds nice and dandy, right? Well, you obviously haven’t met this particular Bedsider ambassador!
First, I forgot to add the lemon and lime juice to the cookie dough before it baked, which resulted in my grandmother taking out the half-baked dough and mixing it in. Then, I added the juice when I mixed the cream cheese…and almost had a conniption fit when I remembered that dairy curdles in acid. Luckily, that only resulted in a truffle mixture that was almost too mushy to turn into balls. Of course I made the balls too big, but grandma came to the rescue by cutting them in half.
At last all was good with the world, but then…
…the Mac Daddy of all truffle-making mishaps happened when I tried to melt the freaking chocolate. I started with 2 bags of top-of-the-Ghirardelli ‘white pieces,’ which I now realize don’t have chocolate listed anywhere in the ingredients. Fast forward two hours and 200 tears and I was sitting on the floor with a pot of brown powder instead of luscious, creamy, melted white chocolate.
Amid the panic and sorrow, I started to think. If I didn’t have the patience to read through and correctly execute a recipe with only 5 ingredients, how could I realistically expect the average 20-something to always use birth control correctly without some support?
The moral of the story? It might take a few tries to get everything right, and that’s okay. If we don’t give up on sex, we really shouldn’t give up on birth control…or melting chocolate.
So I didn’t give up. After two new bags of REAL white chocolate and more help from grandma, I finally had my truffles…and had learned a valuable lesson.
Not too shabby, eh?
College Week, Day 2: UMD’s Recipe for Success
It’s College Week at Bedsider, a chance to highlight the efforts of our amazing campus ambassadors. Today’s “College Week spotlight” is on the always-spunky, super-enthusiastic, basically unstoppable University of Maryland (UMD) ambassadors.
UMD ambassador chillin’ with Bedsider ‘Get on birth control’ swag.
Ingredients
- 4 passionate ambassadors with a pinch of crazy and strong arms for carrying things across an impossibly large college campus
- 3 volunteers with incredible patience and vigilance
- 10 gallons of birth control method knowledge
- A stocked pantry full of the opportunities for baked-good nirvana
- 300 ‘#1 tip for hotter sex? Get on birth control’ cups
- Tissue paper for garnish
- 1 metric ton of candy
- Enough condoms that if your grandmother found them she would die of shock
- Bedsider text reminders to taste
- 2 pinches of tech savvy
- 1 very large blue bin with no way to carry it comfortably
- A generous helping of Bedsider.org—don’t skimp, this will bring everything together and is also quite good on its own
Directions
1 In advance, combine tissue-paper garnish, condoms, candy, and Bedsider text reminder cards in cups and put aside until needed.
2 The afternoon before your event, whip up a baked good that can captivate the interest of your audience (ex: penis-shaped brownies).
3 While your sweet treats are in the oven, combine the four Bedsider Ambassadors in one room and let the crazy out for at least 20 minutes, with five minutes of actual preparation and practice.
4 The morning of your event, pack all ingredients in the large ungainly blue bin including: stuffed cups, more candy, more swag, a tablecloth, bananas for games, and your phallic-shaped sweet treats.
5 Lug the very large, ungainly blue bin to the ungodly-far-away location on campus.
6 Once you reach your location, try to decipher room numbers and ask hesitantly to random passersby if they were the ones who requested an amazing birth control presentation. Repeat until you have found the correct room.
7 Set up, eat baked goods, take control, and BLOW THEIR MINDS! Take questions.
8 Pack everything up and repeat.
Happy reviewers of this recipe:
Bananas are our favorite phalluses.
“Hello! I used this recipe at a recent event I held at a resident hall called “Sexy Ice Cream” and I can definitely recommend it. We went in expecting a table event BUT ended up giving a full walk-through with games and trivia taking up the better part of an hour. It always pays to come prepared!”
The more Ambassadors, the better.
“Used this recipe all three nights of The Vagina Monologues! It was so good I made it three nights in a row. The only thing I had to change was the number of Ambassadors from night to night.”
The most important thing I’ve learned as a campus ambassador is to just have fun with it. If you show girls you’re engaging with that you’re comfortable and open for discussion, they will become less nervous too and it will lead to some really meaningful conversations.
Tell us what you think about Bedsider?
Your opinion means a lot—and we promise the survey won’t take long!
The pill, only when you get lucky
What if there was a birth control pill you didn’t need to take every. single. day? If you like the sound of a pill that works to prevent pregnancy when taken within a few hours of sex, you’re not alone….
Birth Control Basics
sfsi:
One of our great SexEd partners-Bedsider: The one stop for your birth control questions. Call us if you need more answers.
Aw, thanks you guys… we feel the same way about you! (And yes, call SFSI if you need more answers at 877-401-1799.)
It doesn’t matter what position you’re in—reverse cowgirl, missionary, standing, whatever. Sperm + egg + sticking to the uterus = pregnancy.
Bedsider in the Wild: UMD’s End-of-Semester Frenzy
In September of 2012, Bedsider launched its first-ever student-run programs at University of Maryland, University of South Carolina, American University, and Howard University. The Bedsider Campus Ambassador program takes birth control to college students in their natural habitat—the wild world of campus. You will spot Bedsider hosting trivia nights, showing fun movies, and dropping some birth control knowledge in the quad. And because this internet thing is here to stay, you can connect with all the campus programs on Facebook.
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Classes are just getting started here at UMD, so instead of being productive and paying attention in class (who really pays attention during the syllabus overview, anyway?) we’ve decided to take a look back at the Great End-of-Semester Bedsider Frenzy of 2012 here at UMD. As you know, Bedsider UMD is crazy up to our ears in birth control madness, which is why we agreed to host five events in a little more than a week during finals season.
Our first stop was at the Awareness Is Sexy Festival at the University of Maryland Health Center in honor of AIDS awareness. We were stoked that the students there bombarded our table, and we were lucky enough to catch a few Bedsider second timers. Our birth control balloons flew off our table because, seriously, who doesn’t love birth control balloons?
In true Greek form, tragedy struck during our presentation to the Delta Gamma sorority—our penis brownies went flaccid. Okay, they might have just broken in half, but at least a limp-looking brownie tastes just as good as an intact one. In better news, every single one of our condoms were snatched up. Such enthusiasm!
Sometimes it happens to the best of us.
Next we got to visit the sexiest musical of them all—The Rocky Horror Picture Show. There we entertained the unsuspecting masses in line with tutus and trays full of Bedsider swag, condoms, candy, and heads full of birth control knowledge.
Bedsider ready for the time warp with some serious swag.
Our next two presentations were to the Satanic Mechanics and the cast of The Vagina Monologues—both crazy awesome and excited about condoms and birth control. The Satanic Mechanics must have asked a billion questions and we loved answering them—it was a 100% WIN for Bedsider UMD.
Meanwhile, the Vagina Monologues cast was definitely comfortable with their vaginas so there was no holding back with those ladies. While we got to talk about female condoms, the ring, and other birth control topics, the best part was comparing everyone’s O face—a great way to cap off the visit.
But alas, the Great Finals Frenzy of 2012 had to come to an end, so we decided to hand out free donuts, coffee, and candy canes at Mckeldin Library (of course the coffee was in Bedsider cups—what else?). All in all, finals season was definitely more fun with Bedsider around—but we might be a little biased.
And since everyone loves a good climactic finish, here’s a picture of the Vagina Monologues cast doing their thing. Get it, ladies!
Ooooooooooooo!
Bedsider in the Wild: USC Back-to-School Edition
In September of 2012, Bedsider launched its first-ever student-run programs at University of Maryland, University of South Carolina, American University, and Howard University. The Bedsider Campus Ambassador program takes birth control to college students in their natural habitat—the wild world of campus. You will spot Bedsider hosting trivia nights, showing fun movies, and dropping some birth control knowledge in the quad. And because this internet thing is here to stay, you can connect with all the campus programs on Facebook.
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Out with the old, in with the new! To get us into the mood for Spring 2013, we thought we’d share some fond memories from last semester. Back in November (the 27th, to be precise), as an end-of-semester treat, we put together a Bedsider “Between the Sheets” Movie Night. It was the first big event that the University of South Carolina (USC) Ambassadors held as a part of the Bedsider in the Wild campaign, which aims to bring birth control to college students and other young adults “in their natural habitat.” Our movie night was open to anyone and we had extra help from The Feminist Majority Leadership Alliance (who helped us get the room) and Students With A Responsible Message (SWARM), who were awesome enough to bring free condoms for everyone!
SWARM with their awesome condoms and mini lubes (yes, those exist!)
We started out the night with pizza and Bedsider Fact or Fiction videos, which were playing as people walked in. The videos definitely broke the ice and led to some pretty interesting conversations about common sex myths—like that you can’t get pregnant the first time you have sex or that certain positions can literally stop the sperm from working. Um, fiction. After everyone settled down with their pizza, we were ready to start Friends With Benefits. Because, seriously, who has hotter sex than Justin Timberlake and Mila Kunis?
No one, that’s who. Throughout the movie we had people signing up for birth control reminders and checking out Bedsider.org and our awesome Facebook page on their smartphones and laptops.
At the end of movie we passed out awesome prizes and free swag and answered questions about Bedsider. The first 10 people who signed up for our text reminders got a free Bedsider t-shirt—and trust me when I say there is no better prize for a college student than something that lets them put off laundry for another day (or two). The first 15 people who liked our Facebook page also got a Bedsider prize pack and at the end of the night we raffled off a $25 IHOP gift card to one lucky winner!
The good times didn’t stop there—we passed out candy canes on Greene Street and at Pendleton Bridge in the week between classes and exams. And let me tell you, nothing is better than the look on someone’s face when you not only hand them candy, but hand them candy that has the #1 tip for hotter sex.
Our lovely USC Campus Ambassadors at movie night!
PS: Want to know that #1 tip for better sex? Get on birth control!
