Kristen (Isa) Dyer

Name:Isa K Dyer
Age: 21
Major: International Studies
Hometown: San Francisco
 

 
One word was all it took for USF student Kristen (Isa) Dyer to win the trip of a lifetime to the HIV/AIDS affected land of South Africa with the incredible singer, songwriter, and philanthropist Alicia Keys. Alicia Keys’ foundation, Keep a Child Alive, selected five individuals, Kristen being one of them, to travel with her to South Africa to film a documentary on the fight against this deadly disease, encouraging people across the world to do something to support this desperate cause. Not only was Kristen able to travel to South Africa with Alicia Keys and four other contest winners, but she also had the opportunity to attend the premiere of the documentary in New York!
 
If you could describe traveling to South Africa with Alicia Keys in three words, what would they be?
 
Challenging, humbling, authentic
 
How did you find out about and get the opportunity to travel to South Africa with Alicia Keys?
 
It was really an out-of-the-blue commercial I saw on either TV or YouTube that was talking about Alicia Keys’ organization, Keep A Child Alive, and what they do and it said they would choose 5 people to accompany her back to Africa and to start off the contest you had to text in a 5 dollar donation and then enter one word to describe Africa. I chose STRENGTH. 24,000 people entered this contest and 100 words were chosen. The 100 finalists were contacted a few months later (I had completely forgotten I had entered the contest) and we were told we had to create a profile and blog about ourselves and what Africa meant to us, why we should be chosen, etc. And Alicia and her crew sat around for weeks going back and forth and narrowing people and creeping our facebooks to make sure our hearts were in the right place and after much deliberation, we got the calls. 
 
Tell us a little bit about your experience in South Africa.
 
My experience in South Africa was probably 10 times what viewers will see from the film. But I must say the documentary does an outstanding job of putting viewers right next to us helping out in the clinics that KCA funds and it’s basically like we are bringing all of you along with us. 

What was the most challenging element of the trip?
 
The trip was emotionally and physically challenging in the sense we were constantly exposed to suffering and filming from dawn until dusk so we were just completely exposed and laid out everything in front of the camera which is a really, actually, intense way to experience what is going on over there. But it was nothing but amazing and the connections between the five of us winners and Alicia, KCA staff, film crew, and her family (we all literally filled up a good part of a plane) were completely real and a whole new family was created. 
 

What was your favorite experience of the trip?
 
Sitting by the Indian Ocean at midnight in front of a bonfire after we had wrapped filming for the day. All of us hanging on each other just completely overwhelmed, unwinding. Just unforgettable. 
 
What moved you most about the trip?
 
The willingness of the children and people suffering from AIDS or being orphamed by AIDS to open their hearts to us and lay out their spirits to us
 
Did the trip change or enhance your perspective of the fight against HIV/AIDS in any way?
 
It definitely enhanced it because It gave  faces of the pandemic, meeting children raising themselves and their siblings because their parents died from aids. Meeting babies and children raped because people think that sex with a virgin cures the disease, etc. it just made me realize how many dimensions there are to the fight against HIV/AIDS and how much work we have to do. 
 
What can people in the United States do to help countries like South Africa fight the battle against HIV/AIDS?

They can watch the documentary, educate themselves, and rise to the occasion to incorporate the pandemic into utilizing whatever gifts or talents they have in order to do something for the cause. And of course they can immediately help KCA by texting ALIVE to 90999 to donate $5 that is simply added their cell phone bill.
 
Tell us about your trip to New York!

The NYC premiere was absolutely fantastic and intimate and it was absolutely amazing to see an audience react to our documentary and the reaction was one I’ll never forget. The best part was being reunited with everyone again and seeing Alicia and the wonderful crew from KCA.
 
How did you become interested in international studies?

I have always had a passion for the world and my goal is to be able to travel the world, photograph and expose the realities of those that have no one to stand up for them. I figured in order to do that, I have to know what I’m looking at. 
 
What do you hope to do when you graduate? What are your aspirations for the future?

Photo Philanthropy, I hope to secure grant funding or work with an organization that allows me to travel back to these sites and others and give light to what is going on in the world. 

What activities/organizations are you involved in on campus?

I work in the Dean’s Office of Arts and Sciences while I am not in class, which takes up all of my time as I also am without parents, so I have to be completely self-sufficient and unfortunately have no time for any other on-campus activities. However, in working there for the past 4 years, I have been fortunate enough to participate in helping students navigate and find their way through all events hosted by the Dean’s Office. 
 
What off-campus activities are you involved in?

I also hold many off-campus jobs in order to sustain myself in SF and they range from administrative duties, events, nannying, and then photography on the weekends and such. Then school is a job in itself!

For how long have you been interested in photography? Did you learn on your own or are you self-taught?
I am completely self-taught and started really pursuing it as a passion in 2009.

On your photography website, you go by Isabella Woods. Is there a story behind that name?

I actually go by Isabella or Isa and Kristen Dyer is merely a legal name that I never connected with since childhood, so that will most likely be changed in the near future.

If you could offer one piece of advice or encouragement to Her Campus readers, what would it be?

Stay true to yourself and work on being an authentic individual in every aspect of your life and everything else will fall into place. 
 
Anything else you’d like to say to say to Her Campus readers?

I just want to throw in my favorite quote by Simone Weil that a USF Professor of Comp Lit in Conflicts and Culture, Annabel Lee, introduced me to that connects me to this cause in an insurmountable way. “Attention is the rarest and purest form of generosity.”
 
 
For more information on Alicia Keys’ Keep a Child Alive documentary, to watch a video featuring more of what Kristen, this week’s USF Campus Celebrity, had to say about her trip, or to find more ways to help the HIV/AIDS victims in Africa, visit the Keep a Child Alive website, http://keepachildalive.org/keepachildalivewithaliciakeys/.
 
And don’t forget to watch Alicia Keys’ Keep a Child Alive documentary, featuring USF’s own Kristen (Isa) Dyer!