Ads by Google Ads by Google

American Samoa Area Health Education Center sets vision with new logo

[Courtesy photo]

The American Samoa Area Health Education Center (ASAHEC), under the umbrella of the American Samoa Community College (ASCC), aims to inspire the youth to seek careers in the health field, and the mission is to improve the health of the local community through education and health workforce development, because says ASAHEC, we are capable of "Growing Our Own Healers" in the territory.

With that in mind, AHEC coordinator Monica Taumulioali'i Afalava wanted to create a new logo that embodied the true spirit of what Area Health Education Center (AHEC) is about.

The new logo, which was proposed and has received approval from the ASAHEC Community Advisory Board is now the official logo for the program. (Pictured side by side are images of the old logo and the new one.)

Afalava explained that her new logo has four key components.

The figure with stretched arms represents youth and outreach. The snake is a symbol of medicine, inspired by Moses and the bronze serpent in the Bible. The leaves are a symbol of healing.

“I chose to use taro leaves, because of its significance in American Samoa,” Afalava told Samoa News over the weekend. “In 1993, our people suffered from a taro blight, and we are still unable to grow our native taro due to its impact. The effects of the blight represent our fight for optimum health.

“The fourth and final component is the braid/ afa which represents the importance of community — how we are all intertwined and must work together in order to accomplish our goals.

“After reading the bylaws, I wanted to create something that represented the program more accurately,” she said.

Currently, the ASAHEC program is hosting a free two-week event called the 2017 Summer Health Academy, “designed to expose students to various careers in the health field, while also educating them about how to lead healthy lifestyles, in hopes that they would be interested in pursuing a career in the health field,” said Afalava.