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Goal 4
Questions – Social Action
The last pilot project activity engaged students and teachers in thinking about steps their schools can take to address HIV/AIDS in their own communities. The goal is to focus on what the teachers themselves could do--not OTHERS or the GOVERNMENT. After answering the following questions, each school was asked to present an Action Plan for an activity that they would do in the next few months. These are the questions:
- What can you do in your community to prevent the spread of HIV?
- What challenges would your prevention activities face?
- What is peer education?
- Are there any HIV/AIDS non-governmental organizations working in your community?
- Are condoms available in your area? If so, are they used?
- Are there orphans in your area? If so, are they going to school?
How would YOU answer these questions? Have you thought
about putting together an HIV/AIDS Action Plan for YOUR school and YOUR
community?
Educational
Goal 4: Social Action
1) What can you do in your community to prevent the
spread of HIV?
Students
and teachers named a number of activities they could do to continue to
raise HIV/AIDS awareness:
- Continue distributing information
- Working with Parent-Teacher Associations
- Encouraging openness and honesty re: AIDS deaths
- Invite testimonies from people living with HIV/AIDS
- Organize HIV/AIDS Quiz competitions
2) What challenges would your prevention activities face?
School participants rightly named a number of challenges to their HIV/AIDS prevention and care activities. These include:
- Fund-raising
- Perception that AIDS is not an important issue
- Church opposition to condoms
- Getting HIV/AIDS materials in local languages
- Cultural traditions resistant to change, e.g. male dominance
Only one participant understood that peer education is a youth activity often used in reproductive health programs. It is not just youth talking to one another, but TRAINED young people assisting their peers who need reproductive health information and services. Peer educators are trained in decision-making, referring youth to the services they need, or in providing some of those services themselves (like counseling). Peer educators (sometimes called peer promoters or peer counselors) work with youth one-on-one or in a small group.
However, after the International AIDS Conference in South Africa in July 2000, one WorLD teacher was inspired enough to start a peer education program at his school in Ghana. With the assistance of a local non-governmental organization (NGO), AIDS Action Group, the West Africa Secondary School held a 4-day Peer Educators Training Workshop in the WorLD computer lab. Good job, Mr. Chris Kwei! (For more information on this activity, contact Mr. Kwei at ckwei@wass.worldgh.net)
For more information on Peer Education, check out the websites of FOCUS on Young Adults and Advocates for Youth.
4) Are there any HIV/AIDS non-governmental organizations (NGOs) working in your community?
FIVE schools told the WorLD HIV/AIDS Collaborative Project that NGOs are working on prevention and care in their area:
School
HIV/AIDS NGO
WorLD Chinhoyi in Zimbabwe
Batsirayi Group
Marondera High School in Zimbabwe
Red Cross
St. Mary’s College in Uganda
The AIDS Support Group (TASO)
Ngaka Maseko Secondary School in South Africa
Planned Parenthood Association of SA
West Africa Secondary School in Ghana
AIDS Action Group, HIV Network
5) Are condoms available in your area? If so, are they used?
About 87% of students and teachers said that condoms are available in their community.
Some, however, for instance in Ghana, said that condoms are used by only a small percentage of people, because there is still a lot of resistance to condoms, especially by churches. And in South Africa, one participant said that some people still equate condoms to a lack of trust. And in Zimbabwe, they are used only by those who can afford them, because they are still discouraged by tradition and religion.
6) Are there orphans in your community? If so, are they going to school?
EVERY participant said that there are orphans in their community, and only some are going to school.
