MSHAPE is promoting a greater awareness of men’s health issues and building a stronger more supportive community. Programming is community-driven, with a core group of local volunteers meeting regularly to provide direction and feedback.
In January 2007, SAAF began using the Mpowerment model as the foundation for its programming for MSM. Mpowerment is a community-building program centered on the theory of diffusion of innovations. Programming is community-driven, with a core group of local volunteers meeting regularly to provide direction and feedback. In addition, MSHAPE utilizes health education, targeted outreach, and community event coordination components in its overall program design.
Other program activities include material distribution of over 70,000 pieces annually (condoms, safer-sex kits, brochures), collaborating with the Pima County Health Department to provide monthly, mobile HIV and syphilis testing at locations throughout the local gay community, and partnering with the Man 2 Man program to help men identify and resolve issues that are barriers to a healthy sense of sexuality.
MSHAPE also has a community lounge! The Lounge has computers with internet, a DVD/book library, movie nights and game nights. The lounge is at 375 S. Euclid Ave.
MSHAPE is run by a “Core Group” of 10-20 gay/bisexual men from the community with the support of paid staff. The Core Group, along with other volunteers, design and carry out all MSHAPE activities. MSHAPE has its own lounge space where most event planning and meetings are held. The MSHAPE Lounge also serves as a drop-in center where gay/bisexual men meet and support each other.
M-groups are workshops about health issues affecting men in our community; topics include HIV, STD's, Substance Use and many others. Check the MSHAPE Calendar for when the M-groups are being held.
MSHAPE began programming in January 2007 under its new name. It evolved out of the Gay Men’s Health Project (GMHP) which began in 1996 with a twelve-month evaluation and research project. With the results of that evaluation, a request was written to the Arizona Department of Health Services (ADHS) to fund local prevention programming for gay men. ADHS began funding GMHP to provide HIV Prevention to gay men who frequent gay bars, as this target population was noted to be at much higher risk of contracting HIV than non-bar going gay men.
GMHP grew from being staffed by one part-time position to a full time staff of three, with many volunteers that helped to staff the various events that GMHP produced. These volunteers also formed the base of GMHP’s Peer Working Group (PWG). The PWG was a diverse collection of community members who met once a month to provide ideas, feedback and support to the GMHP staff.
