The Great Sex Debate

Does abstinence-only education work?

DANIEL GILES/TimesDaily

HIV/AIDS counselor Pete Key uses a character, “Ray Ray,” to talk to students at Deshler High School about abstinence and STDs.

By Kenda Williams
Staff Writer

Published: Monday, July 2, 2007 at 3:30 a.m.
Last Modified: Sunday, July 1, 2007 at 11:29 p.m.

In a sex education play for teenagers called “Truth and Consequences,” a fictitious 15-year-old boy named Ray Ray chooses to have unprotected sex even though he knows of the possible dangers.

Ray Ray is played by Pete Key, a local motivational speaker and certified HIV/AIDS instructor, who presents an awareness program called “Determine Your Destiny.”

“That one moment of pleasure could cause you a lifetime of pain because it only takes one time,” Key’s character says to teens.

Key uses the performances to speak to teens about the decisions they face, what outcomes can result from their decisions and ways to avoid making decisions with negative consequences.

Funding for abstinence-only programs may be in jeopardy. The legislation authorizing funding for abstinence-only programs in schools would have expired Saturday. On Wednesday, House members extended the funding for three months and are scheduled to address the issue when they reconvene this month.

Under Section 510 of Title V, Congress authorized $50 million be provided annually for five years to states in the form of block grants to promote abstinence-until-marriage programs.

Alabama receives $953,172 for such programs, according to the Alabama Department of Public Health.

Susan Stewart, state abstinence education coordinator, said the program has been successful despite criticism from proponents for a more comprehensive sex education program that would include teaching birth control and condom use and not just abstinence.

“(Those proponents) have constantly lobbied Congress to get rid of abstinence-until- marriage (programs) because of the negative feedback saying they don’t work,” Stewart said. “We do have proof that they do work.”

Schools across the state and nation are required to teach HIV prevention education, as well as provide general classroom instruction on issues like abstinence and sexually transmitted diseases. They must adhere to federal and state laws on what can and cannot be taught in sex education curriculum or programs.

“By law, the basis for our instruction has to be abstinence only,” said Billy Warren, curriculum director for Florence schools.

Warren said HIV/AIDS awareness instruction begins at fifth grade and continues through high school. Sex education is incorporated into science and health courses beginning in sixth grade and also continues through high school.

Warren said programs like Key’s are great learning avenues to present such information. “My hope is that through education, better decisions will be made,” he said.

Brittany Williams was an 11th-grader when she heard Key’s program at Deshler High School in Tuscumbia during the past school year.

“Most sex-ed programs tell you don’t do it. (Key) told us all the repercussions that could happen,” Williams said.

Key said he receives mixed reviews about his program from teens and adults.

“What I found is that when we talk about a kid abstaining, there are so many other factors playing up to that,” Key said. “It’s more than just about having sex or not to have sex.”

Critics of abstinence-only programs cite a report released in April by Mathematica Policy Research Inc. that claims abstinence-only programs are unsucessful.

Results from the 10-year study note that after reviewing several abstinence-only programs funded under Title V, it was discovered that children taught under those programs were no more likely to abstain from sex than those who don’t take part in such programs.

James Wagoner, president of Advocates for Youth, agrees with the report’s findings and said that a more “balanced approach” should be presented in sex education that includes abstinence and contraceptives.

“The report shows abstinence-only-until-marriage programs don’t work,” Wagoner said. “You have millions upon millions of young people that are getting no information about prevention.”

He said teaching abstinence, STD awareness and learning how to deal with peer pressure are important aspects of sex education, but the curriculum needs to go beyond that.

“The time has come in this country where we need a national, honest conversation … and help young people in this country balance, in a responsible way, their sexual health and desires with their needs to make good choices,” he said.

Valerie Huber, executive director of the National Abstinence Education Association, however, said the Mathematica study results should not be generally applied to all abstinence education programs and noted that the study began when Title V abstinence education programs were still in their infancy.

“The study examined only four out of a pool of over 700 Title V programs,” Huber said in a press release. “These narrow findings represent less than 1 percent of all Title V projects across the nation.

“There is overwhelming support from parents and teens for abstinence education – especially when people understand that the emphasis of abstinence education centers on building healthy relationships, enhancing self-esteem and discussing the impact that sexual activity can have on a teen’s future goals.”

While the issue is debated at the national level, local young people have mixed feelings about abstinence-only versus comprehensive programs.

Zack Crowell, 20, of Muscle Shoals, recalled the classes at his high school. He said the sex education classes were informative, but kids usually chose to have sex anyway.

“The classes were … straight from the book. They teach abstinence is the best way. It needs to be more detailed, though, in a different way and more informational,” he said.

On the other hand, Leanna Hammack, 14, who attends Wayne County High School, said the abstinence message is getting through to teens.

“We have an abstinence program at least once a year. I think it’s helpful,” she said. “It makes you have second thoughts about stuff. They teach people that you’re really not cool just for having sex.”

TimesDaily Staff Writer Kenda Williams can be reached at 740-5720 or kenda.williams@timesdaily.com.

Medill News Service staff writer Alexandra Steigrad contributed to this report.

The Arts November 30, 2005 Archives:

World AIDS Day celebrated with vigil, activist

BY LAURA RASKIN INDEPENDENT WRITER

AIDS awareness activist

Ole Pete Key will be on

island tomorrow for an

educational training

concert.

Ole Pete Key asks, “D'ya know what I mean?" a lot at the end of his statements. It

is endearing and equalizing, this call for understanding. Key (the "Ole" is a nickname

he got a long time ago that means "voice of victory" or “voice of triumph") has the

right not to ask you, but just to tell you. A leading AIDS awareness activist, certified

HIV/AIDS instructor, social worker and general motivational speaker on the topic of choices and their consequences, Key has a body of knowledge and experience that gives him license to preach. Instead, the 36-year-old from Alabama has spent the

last eight years of his life developing a system for inspiring mostly young people to think about the consequences of drugs, sex, alcohol and peer pressure. He does so mostly through music – rap and hip hop – and skits, and he performs in educational training

concerts across the country. He has found that youth throw away grainy pamphlets and brochures, but they remember lyrics. If they can remember Snoop Dog they can remember Ole Pete Key.

Key performs at all-school assemblies at Cyrus Peirce Middle School and Nantucket High School on Thursday, Dec. 1, which is also World AIDS Day. Sponsored by

the donors to the Nantucket AIDS Network, Key's appearance is one of NAN's concerted efforts to educate the youth of the island in a new way. Also on Dec. 1 is

the World AIDS Day Community Sing and Celebration of Life service at the Unitarian Church at 7 p.m., ending with a candlelight walk to the harbor in remembrance of those who have died from AIDS. NAN Director of Development and Community Outreach

Gordon McGregor saw Key at the Ryan White National Youth Conference in Nashville, named after the white middle class Indiana teen who drew worldwide attention

because he was infected with HIV through treatment for his hemophilia. “I thought [Key] was a must-have because of the way he presents his message to young people. It's something we haven't seen," said McGregor. “He has a smart and powerful way of bringing the message of AIDS awareness and considering abstinence as a choice."

Key was born to a father who was an avid reader and a mother, grandmother and great-grandfather who were writers. Music and writing, even if it was negative, were always important to him. Part of what makes Key such a powerful voice and not a condescending one is that he was not always someone who thought about the

consequences of his actions. He does not specify, but he calls the decade between 1987 and 1997 a reckless one. He was living in Atlanta and doing "anything and

everything." "I was headed down the wrong path," said Key in a relaxed telephone interview the day after Thanksgiving. "I was married. I was turning to alcohol and smoking blunts – anything I could do to relieve stress, but getting more stressed out." One night he turned on the TV and watched a man dressed in a sweat suit preach, "You're better than what you're doing." Key changed the channel and changed it back. "I really listened to this guy. Before you know it I was pouring out my liquor. It was God saying 'Hey, I've got something for you to do.' The light came on," said Key. From that day to this day he has not had another drink or smoke. Key always loved to talk and motivate, but he did not know how touse his gift, he said. Later, Key found out that the man in the sweat suit was a pastor at a local church. "I'm so thankful that it happened," he said of that chance encounter through the screen. People have told Key he is a different person now.

Slowly he began to get into the work that he now talks about as a mission. Musically, it began when he watched former President Bill Clinton speak about AIDS in Africa.

Key wrote a song – a letter to a 15-year-old called "Wait." He sang it one night in a group meeting at which there were employees from the local health department.

They urged him to perform it elsewhere, then to get a scholarship, then to get trained as an AIDS educator. "What I'm saying is not new in terms of what health educators are saying, but the youth are more in tune. It's been pretty effective so far," said Key. He hopes to garner more funding and grant sources. Key knows music is contributing to some (he is clear not to say all) of the behaviors of youth that lead them down

dangerous roads. "Maybe we can use it to bring some of the solutions," he said. "Sometimes people don't like the messenger, but music has a way of breaking down the

barriers."

Young audiences often ask Key if he is HIV positive. He is not. He is still married to the same woman he was married to on the fateful night in 1997, and they have two

young girls. He said he does not take this for granted. Many of the behaviors he used to indulge in could have easily resulted in his contracting HIV. He still thinks about a woman he met who is living with AIDS 20 years after she was infected at 13, the first time she had sexual intercourse and before she had her first menstrual cycle.

"You know what I mean?" Key pleads, asking the listener to understand the weight of the story. With his wife, Key runs Ole Pete Key Inc. and sells CDS like "The WAIT Project" (Why Am I Tempted?). His goal is to get it in the hands of as many seven-to-12 year olds as possible. Key also runs The Fatherhood Program at a local Head Start in Alabama. He helps reconnect noncustodial fathers with their children's education.

"I love that," he said.

Don't do it

By Katie Nichols (Contact) | Selma Times-Journal

Published Tuesday, February 10, 2009

Photo by Katie Nichols

Ole Pete Key tells Selma High School students lessons through song.

A man clad in an orange jumpsuit ambled into the Selma High School gym Tuesday morning to talk straight about drugs, alcohol and sex.

Pete Key isn’t a felon. He’s a teacher. His subject: making wise choices.

“One moment of pleasure can cause of lifetime of pain,” he said. “It only takes one time to get infected.”

Ole Pete Key, as he is known during his presentations, decided to approach youth in a different way.

He uses drama, hip-hop and R&B songs and interaction to get across to students how to make good decisions.

After Key walked out onto the gym floor, he became a 30 year-old convict looking back on the choices he made that led him to jail.

Key asked how many people knew someone on drugs, alcohol or HIV positive. Most of the students raised their hands.

“How many of those people do you think decided to be a drunk or on drugs when they were your age?” Key asked. “How many thought they would have HIV?”

Key is traveling around the Black Belt Region teaching students thanks to a federal grant.

Sharlene Key, his wife, said they contacted District Attorney Michael Jackson.

“We asked him what schools would be good to speak to in the area,” she said. “He said Selma High School would be a great school.”

The “Determine Your Destiny” program based in Florence began traveling around the state reaching as many schools as possible.

Pete Key uses songs with a catchy tune to educate students about the dangers of making wrong choices.

“It only takes one mistake to ruin your life,” he said. “You’ve got to be aware of what you’re doing.”

At the end of the program, Key read statistics for people in Selma and Dallas County infected with HIV.

The report, as of Dec. 19, 2008, stated of the 168 cases in Selma, 61 were black females, 95 were black males, one white female, nine white males and two “other.”

Dallas County had 211 cases — 78 black females, 119 black males, one white female, one white male, two other and one unknown.

Education is Key

Speaker lets students know the risks, facts of HIV

By Lisa Singleton-Rickman

Staff Writer

Published: Monday, March 20, 2006 at 3:30 a.m.

Last Modified: Sunday, March 19, 2006 at 11:00 p.m.

Pete Key is never happier than when he's helping people. - Whether he's at work at Handy Head Start in Florence or traveling the country delivering messages of hope about HIV/AIDS prevention, he's always focused on others. Pete Key (left) and Anthony Brooks take part in a skit on HIV at Deshler Middle School in Tuscumbia. Key, a state-certified HIV/AIDS educator, shared his message Thursday with Deshler Middle School students. And he used terms they understood. Using role playing with a few educational rap songs in the mix, Key spoke directly to students. Playing the role of a fictional eighth-grader, Ray-Ray, Key mesmerized students with his dilemma of having contracted HIV from a one-time sexual encounter with a high school girl.

As he agonized over his positive HIV test results, he ran through scenarios of how others would treat him, fearing his friends would turn away and his minister father would disown him.

He told the students that although Ray-Ray's situation was fictional, it's playing out all over the country.

"In fact, 50 percent of all HIV/AIDS cases involve people 25 and younger," Key said.

He stressed to the sixth-, seventh- and eighth-graders that they must start making good decisions now.

It's a message they've heard regularly at school, especially from their principal, Robert Mullen.

In introducing Key to the students, Mullen told them he considers it an honor to be their principal

because, "I have the vantage point of seeing you all make good decisions and grow up to live productive lives. Not everyone has such a great job."

"Students need the truth and they need to hear it in a straight-forward manner," Key said. "They're smart." And his presentation was to the point. He shared the four ways of contracting AIDS: through blood, semen, breast milk and vaginal fluid. "You don't get it through casual contact like shaking hands or sitting on a toilet behind someone with it,"

Key said. "Just like Ray-Ray in the skit, anyone can get it if they make bad decisions," he said. "And, just like an unwanted pregnancy, it only takes one time and your life can change forever."

Key shared a part of his personal life with students, saying that he only escaped a sexually transmitted disease by the grace of God. "Because of the lifestyle I used to live, I should have been infected with HIV or something else myself," Key said, shocking the students with the admission that he became sexually active at the age of 11. Eighth-grader Stephen Ritter described Key as the kind of speaker "who really captures you." Jabria Madden, also in the eighth grade, agreed. "It was a great program because he used examples of real stuff that can happen and real emotions," she said. "He was right on target with everything he said. He seems to know how kids think."

Program finds communication key to family bliss

By Lisa Singleton-Rickman

Staff Writer

Published: Wednesday, February 14, 2007 at 3:30 a.m.

Last Modified: Tuesday, February 13, 2007 at 11:00 p.m.

FLORENCE -- Pete Key usually meets monthly with the fathers of young children who attend Handy

Head Start. Key is the FAMILY program specialist at the federally funded school for low-income families and those

with disabilities.

He represents a source of encouragement to young men, many of whom aren't married to their children's

mother and who don't always know their responsibilities or rights as a parent.

This month, Key has widened the scope of his session.

The topic, fittingly for Valentine's Day, is marriage. It's a continuation from last week's session, a lively

discussion on the characteristics that make a successful marriage.

Andrew Bonds and Temika Chivers

attended last week's session.

The two will marry Saturday at the Handy school gymnasium before family, friends and as many head

start students and their families who wish to come.

About 18 people attended Key's session, some previously married, some never married. Some said

they'd like to be married, while others said fear of failure keeps them from it.

Everyone in the group expressed hope for a successful, long marriage for Bonds and Chivers.

Key stressed to the group that couples play out what they see their parents do in marriage.

Patience with each other is paramount, the group agreed.

But the key, all agreed, is communication.

"My problem in my marriage was that I wasn't a good communicator," said Aretha Neloms, who shared

with the group that she's learned the importance of knowing what she wants in a mate and how to

express herself.

Having raised four children as a single, working mother, she doesn't consider herself exceptional, she

said.

"I didn't do anything out of the ordinary, just what was necessary," Neloms said. "I definitely believe in

marriage."

Key said the session allows participants to learn from each other, from their successes and mistakes.

Family and marriage counselor Drew Jamieson attended last week's session and agreed that

communication is vital for a strong marriage.

Program finds communication key to family bliss | TimesDaily.com | The Times-Daily | F... Page 3 of 7

http://www.timesdaily.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070214/NEWS/702140327/1011 8/21/2008

"It's not about having to resolve everything," he said. "You just have to talk about it."

Lisa Singleton-Rickman can be reached at 740-5735 or lisa.singleton-rickman@timesdaily.com.

The program opened with a daughter telling her father that she was HIV positive.

“Now let me get this right. You made one mistake. You had sex one time and now you’re telling me you have HIV,” said an in-character Pete Key, a motivational speaker specializing in teach­ing kids about HIV/AIDS. “What am I supposed to do? I don’t even know anything about this HIV and AIDS.”

As the girl portraying the daughter left the stage, Key stepped to the edge of the stage and told the true story of a 13-year-old girl who had sex one time and got infected with HIV.

Urging the Jacksonville High students to repeat the line “it only takes one time,” he began to rap about the dangers sexually active kids face, drilling home the point that someone infected with HIV doesn’t necessarily have to be promiscuous. It only takes one time.

Key, who goes by the stage name Ole Pete Key, doesn’t preach to the teenagers during his program, which teaches kids AIDS awareness and the problems drugs and alcohol can cause. Rather, he takes a taboo, often embarrassing, subject and turns it into songs and raps to get through to the students on their level.

The teens are encouraged to dance, clap and chant along as he teaches them to listen to their parents and teachers, avoid drugs and alcohol and urges them to wait until mar­riage to have sex.

“Now, let me ask you all a question. When is the most appropriate time for someone  to engage in a relationship sexu­ally?” Key asked the JHS teens as they echoed back a resound­ing, “When they’re married.”

Key then listed various times it may happen – “homecoming, the prom, whenever the parents are not home”

Key’s ministry began with a request from God.

“New Year’s Eve, 1997. I basically had that experience, or whatever you want to call it,” he said. He and his wife had been fighting that evening and he had been drinking. “I just had this encounter with God and he said ‘What are you going to do with the rest of your life.’”

Since that time, he has lived his life asking himself that question and he’s worked to make sure what he does with his life is done to help others.

Soon thereafter, Pete became involved with the Red Cross and their HIV and AIDS aware­ness program. One day, he took the basic message and made it into a song.

“I learned about HIV and AIDS through the Red Cross and became an AIDS educa­tor. I would do workshops and the kids would throw away the pamphlets and brochures,” he said. “I wrote a song about HIV, which is the song “Wait.” I was at this group meeting with about 150 men and I shared the song and then somebody from the health department talked for about an hour and a half. I did a five-minute song and the guys remembered more of the song than an hour and a half of teaching.”

He and his wife, Sharlene, have now turned his songs and demonstrations into a program of their own and they travel throughout the country showing teens how to ‘determine their destiny.’

“Last year we were awarded a grant to go into some schools and I learned then it wasn’t just sex, it was decision-making, it was drugs. So now I can’t just tell them not to do it. There are just so many other things that contribute to the behavior before they ever say, "I’ll do it."

JENNIFER BACCHUS

jbacchus@jaxnews.com

Key presented an eclec­tic mix of song and les­sons to the students of Jacksonville High School

The program opened with a daughter telling her father that she was HIV positive.

“Now let me get this right. You made one mistake. You had sex one time and now you’re telling me you have HIV,” said an in-character Pete Key, a motivational speaker specializing in teach­ing kids about HIV/AIDS. “What am I supposed to do? I don’t even know anything about this HIV and AIDS.”

As the girl portraying the daughter left the stage, Key stepped to the edge of the stage and told the true story of a 13-year-old girl who had sex one time and got infected with HIV.

Urging the Jacksonville High students to repeat the line “it only takes one time,” he began to rap about the dangers sexually active kids face, drilling home the point that someone infected with HIV doesn’t necessarily have to be promiscuous. It only takes one time.

Key, who goes by the stage name Ole Pete Key, doesn’t preach to the teenagers during his program, which teaches kids AIDS awareness and the problems drugs and alcohol can cause. Rather, he takes a taboo, often embarrassing, subject and turns it into songs and raps to get through to the students on their level.

The teens are encouraged to dance, clap and chant along as he teaches them to listen to their parents and teachers, avoid drugs and alcohol and urges them to wait until mar­riage to have sex.

“Now, let me ask you all a question. When is the most appropriate time for someone  to engage in a relationship sexu­ally?” Key asked the JHS teens as they echoed back a resound­ing, “When they’re married.”

Key then listed various times it may happen – “homecoming, the prom, whenever the parents are not home”

Key’s ministry began with a request from God.

“New Year’s Eve, 1997. I basically had that experience, or whatever you want to call it,” he said. He and his wife had been fighting that evening and he had been drinking. “I just had this encounter with God and he said ‘What are you going to do with the rest of your life.’”

Since that time, he has lived his life asking himself that question and he’s worked to make sure what he does with his life is done to help others.

Soon thereafter, Pete became involved with the Red Cross and their HIV and AIDS aware­ness program. One day, he took the basic message and made it into a song.

“I learned about HIV and AIDS through the Red Cross and became an AIDS educa­tor. I would do workshops and the kids would throw away the pamphlets and brochures,” he said. “I wrote a song about HIV, which is the song “Wait.” I was at this group meeting with about 150 men and I shared the song and then somebody from the health department talked for about an hour and a half. I did a five-minute song and the guys remembered more of the song than an hour and a half of teaching.”

He and his wife, Sharlene, have now turned his songs and demonstrations into a program of their own and they travel throughout the country showing teens how to ‘determine their destiny.’

“Last year we were awarded a grant to go into some schools and I learned then it wasn’t just sex, it was decision-making, it was drugs. So now I can’t just tell them not to do it. There are just so many other things that contribute to the behavior before they ever say, "I’ll do it.’”

JENNIFER BACCHUS

jbacchus@jaxnews.com

Key presented an eclec­tic mix of song and les­sons to the students of Jacksonville High School.

Dedicated dad helps other fathers improve

By Lisa Singleton-Rickman

Staff Writer

Last Updated:June 19. 2005 12:00AM

Published: June 19. 2005 6:00AM

FLORENCE -- Pete Key isn't a dad who just talks the talk.

He walks the walk and has had great success in helping other fathers do the same.

The 35-year-old Florence resident is the director of the FAMILY program based at Handy School. The program's name is an acronym for fathers as mentors in learning years.

Even the name of the program was carefully and strategically thought out, and Key is careful to emphasize the word mentor.

"We didn't want to focus on the court system and child support, because there's a lot more than that to being a good father to your child," Key said. "I strive to get these guys to see that they can be a mentor to their children, that kind of positive role model with an important presence in their kids' lives. Once they come to that realization, the other things come."

Key is entering his fourth year with the program. The growth in the number of dads getting involved in their children's school activities and their lives in general has skyrocketed.

His first year, he had six fathers in the program. In 2004, there were 70 contributing a combined 660 volunteer hours.

"It's been phenomenal how it's grown," Key said. "All these guys really needed was someone to help them understand they don't have to have a lot of money or even a great relationship with their child's mother to be involved. They'd gotten the label of deadbeat dads, but it wasn't like they wanted to be. They just didn't know how to get involved."

Key immediately noticed some things about Handy School when he moved back to Florence from Atlanta three years ago: More than 90 percent of the teachers were women, and women were bringing the children to school.

"I started asking, 'Where are all the dads?' "

He also knew the statistics -- that 70 percent of African-American homes are without a father and 25 million children don't have fathers in the home. The numbers haunted him.

Key initially moved back to Florence, his hometown, to be a family social worker. Then the position opened up for the fatherhood program, which Key jumped at.

He began investigating why there weren't more fathers present. He quickly learned they weren't coming around because they didn't have the financial resources.

"I started out by telling these guys, just come and see the child here at school," Key said. "But the main thing is, let that child see you, see that you care."

Gradually, more and more dads became receptive. Now, it's not unusual to see dads helping out in classrooms daily and participating in fundraisers like basketball games.

Key has a fundamental view of the father's role: responsibility for the family from the standpoint of taking the lead and being supportive emotionally, psychologically and even financially.

Key knows all the excuses some fathers have for not spending time with their kids.

"I hear how the mom doesn't want them involved and that they don't have the money for child support so they can't come around -- that's way too easy. It's a different story when the kids start saying, 'Dad, please spend some time with me.' "

Marcus Reeder has been involved in Key's program for the past year. He's quick to say it's been a life-changing experience.

"Pete's showed me through this program that just because you have some obstacles in your life, you can still be a good father to your kids," said Reeder, who has a 13-year-old and a 5-year-old.

Reeder said he realized there were many activities he could do with his children, and he's gained the courage to pursue spending time with them.

"We've started going to church more together, and in the past year, for the first time, I've spent a lot of time with my younger daughter. In fact, she stays with me a lot and I love it."

Until two years ago, Reeder's teenage daughter lived out of state. Since she's been back, Reeder said their relationship has been strained but he's not about to give up.

"I'm working on restoring this relationship, because I want it so bad," he said. "Pete's helping me work out some strategies for getting back on track with her."

So what makes Pete Key so successful at helping restore father-child relationships?

Reeder said it's just a matter of Key knowing how to relate to people. "I've seen it time after time; he just gets right there on the level with these guys and speaks their language," Reeder said. "He's trustworthy, and there's no doubt he really cares."

If there's anyone who knows Key through and through, it's his wife, Sharlene. They became an item in seventh grade and have been together since, marrying nine years ago. The couple have two children, 4-year-old Erin and 3-year-old, Joi.

The Keys also operate a consulting company, traveling the nation as HIV-AIDS educators.

"We've been together 23 years, and I think I know him pretty well," Sharlene said. "What I know, what I've always known, is that he's a caring, giving man whose heart's desire is to help other people any way he can."

With a good life in Atlanta, the couple had Erin, a nice home and a comfortable living. Sharlene was seven months pregnant with Joi when Pete came in one day and said, "I believe I'm supposed to move home, back to Florence."

Pete explained that he'd had a life-changing experience a few years earlier. He prefaces the story by saying, "You might think this is crazy, but it really happened."

One night after an argument with his wife, he began drinking alcohol and went down to his basement for some solitude. He turned on the television and an Atlanta-area preacher caught his attention.

"It was New Year's Eve 1997, and this preacher said, 'You're bigger than where you are and you're better than what you're doing,' " Key recalls. "It hit me so hard. I poured the liquor out and haven't been the same since. It was like I discovered my purpose right then, to start using my gifts to help others."

Key also remembers the preacher saying that God will wreck your dream to give you your destiny.

But that's all right, too, said Key, who admits he doesn't have the income or possessions he once had.

"I see myself as wealthier than ever, a great wife and two great kids and a job I love," he said.

His attitude toward fatherhood comes honestly, as his own father has been a role model for him. He saw his father -- retired from Wise Alloys after 28 years, first with Reynolds, then Wise -- as a model of love and support for his family.

"He always worked hard and taught me that discipline and dedication to family is what's important," Key said.

As for Key's dedication to his own family, that's unquestionable, his wife said.

Every Tuesday he takes the girls out for "daddy day" to give her a break. She jokes that it's hard to tell who looks most forward to Tuesdays, her or Pete.

She tells about one day coming home after the girls had been with their dad awhile and Pete had several little barrettes and hair clips in his hair. They'd been playing beauty shop. "I just thought to myself, now that's a real man -- a true dad," Sharlene said.

Lisa Singleton-Rickman can be reached at 740-5735 or lisa.singleton-rickman@timesdaily.com.

 

Austin program shows HIV risk By Bayne Hughes Staff Writer       Ole Pete Key as Ray Ray entered the Austin High audito­rium chained, handcuffed and escorted by Decatur police. BUY THIS PHOTO  (More info) Reported HIV/AIDS cases in a seven-county area that includes Morgan, Law­rence and Limestone are on the rise. Alabama Department of Public Health statistics show that Public Health Area II has shown an increase from 76 in 2005 to 102 in 2008. Through September, there have been 56 cases. If the statistics don’t sink in, Austin High School teacher Heather Tucker’s medical professions class sponsored a program Monday that made the point that HIV/AIDS is a problem to their classmates. Ole Pete Key presented a program of drama, rap, and shout and response to get his point, “It only takes one time!” across. Key, a Florence native, and his wife, Sharlene, travel the country presenting their message of good decision-making and the teaching the consequences of risky behavior. 50,000 reached They’ve performed before 50,000 students in the last two years. Key, a 1987 Coffee High School graduate, began the program with a one-man drama of an inmate, Ray Ray Jenkins. His story involves having sex once with a pretty girl and catching HIV. A path of destruction followed, including quitting school, doing drugs drugs and ending up in jail. Key said teenagers often believe that something like AIDS could never happen to them. Yet 13 people between the ages of 13 and 24 in Area II this year through September newly reported having the disease. Sharlene Key said the state had a 58 percent increase in teenager cases between 2005 and 2008. She didn’t have specific numbers. She said many don’t know they have the HIV for several years. Determining destiny “One moment of pleasure ... will cost you ... a lifetime of pain,” Pete Key had the crowd of students repeat back to him. “Your decisions determine your own destiny,” he continued. Pete Key reminded the students that HIV can only be transferred through blood, semen, breast milk and vaginal fluid. He compared playing football to having sex while giving a message of abstinence. “Football equipment doesn’t guarantee you won’t get hurt, and neither do condoms during sex,” Pete Key said. “The only way you can avoid the possibility of not getting hurt is not to do it.” The Austin students said after the assembly that the Keys’ message style was effective. They said using rap got the message across because most of the students listen to that style of music. Message received “It was amazing the way he communicated with students and got everyone interested with his rap and song,” senior Jessica Lopez said. Sophomore O’Brien Hewlett said the message will “make me stop and think about what I should and shouldn’t do.” HIV/AIDS reports The Alabama Department of Public Health reports the following number of HIV/AIDS cases locallly.   2005 2006 2007 2008 Total Lawrence 1 1 2 4 8 Limestone* 18 13 14 27 72 Morgan 5 12 10 5 32 *Includes HIV/AIDS inmates housed at Limestone Correctional Facility. BAYNE HUGHES