Beyond The Surface: A Look Into Local HOSA Campaign
Local HOSA campaign, Beauty Beyond Bones, rises to prominence during regionals week.
Created by teens Varsha Ganesh, Riddhi Gosavi, Roshni Manikandan, and Kathambari Ramkumar, this project works to shine light upon the underrepresented topic of tackling eating disorders. The campaign started on May 27, 2020, with an introductory survey and soon spiraled into a network of articles, volunteer hours, and more.
“This started off as a major initiative for our HOSA competition”, Gosavi says, “and we hit upon the idea of debunking myths around eating disorders sometime in May.” After planning extensively upon their slogan and mission, they created a survey to kick things off officially. Receiving a total of 137 responses, this group of teens then created a website with multiple means of getting help. Now, 8 months later, the campaign is ready to face regionals armed with multiple initiatives, events, and measures. This started off as an initiative for our HOSA competition — Riddhi Gosavi
When asked about the major modifications due to COVID-19, Ganesh certainly had a lot to say. “It was difficult to adapt since most of the things we wanted to do would have been more effective in person, but we still pulled through with the resources we had. We just wanted to offer help in one way or another” she says. The team had to move all their events online and worked to build up a distinguished social media presence. Present on their website, Instagram, Pinterest, and Spotify, they were able to acquire a plethora of followers, all interested in working towards the betterment of breaking the stigma surrounding eating disorders.
Since they moved most of their events virtual, there have been multiple exciting opportunities to rise to relevance. Beauty Beyond Bones had launched their blog, With Love, along with their companion podcast, Eat. Sleep. Beauty. Repeat. “I think this was our most important stride towards meeting the public,” Ramkumar stated. According to the girls, they were met with more enthusiasm towards their subtle ways of education since people felt most inclined to do things in their own time. The blog has a steady stream of listeners and the team was able to interview a lot of professionals for their blog, ranging from gratitude coaches to international fitness coaches. “I think that our biggest success was getting connections overseas because it shows judges just how much we strove to make ourselves know,” Ramkumar says, “Even though our mission wasn’t focused on prominence, this was still pretty cool”
Their events ranged from writing letters to nursing homes, which offered volunteer hours, to hosting an online movie night where they watched To The Bone. “We had a pretty large turnout of 75 people which we did not anticipate but greatly appreciated,” Manikandan says, “I’ve been touched with the number of people who have been interacting with us since it shows that there are people out there who care.” This team has more events for the future, after getting a partnership with ANAD (National Association of Anorexia Nervosa and Associated Disorders), ranging from interactive art galleries to a virtual fashion show.
“We’re just getting started but I think we can go places with this campaign,” Gosavi said when asked about her thoughts on the future. Their next goal is facing other groups at regionals, but no matter the outcome, they’re ready to keep this running for the benefit of others. “Bring on the challenge, I’m just ready to make a change” Ganesh offers as a final statement.