AIDSWEB Project

Many of AIDSWEB's educational and peer-based activities involved use of ICTs. Once signed up to participate, each student and teacher filled out an online introductory questionnaire, which was also used by the project facilitator - a reproductive health consultant - as a pre-test. Then participants worked through five online educational goal activities (i.e., Cultural Exchange, Basic Facts of HIV/AIDS, the Importance of HIV/AIDS, the Challenge of HIV Prevention, and Social Action) that allowed them to explore myths and misunderstandings, conduct research, and discuss how they could prevent HIV in their own lives and communities.

Community action was encouraged through the Social Action component of the programme. Students were guided in developing an HIV/AIDS action plan, which might include working with Parent-Teacher Associations, establishing income-generating projects for peers, and inviting testimonies from people living with HIV/AIDS.

The project also worked to increase the quantity and quality of HIV/AIDS educational materials in schools. A CD-ROM with HIV/AIDS-related information drawn from existing online material was produced for schools with slow or no Internet connections. In addition, efforts were made to help adapt locally produced print-based HIV/AIDS educational material for electronic dissemination via CD-ROM and the AIDSWEB site (no longer online). Training materials designed to integrate computer and Internet literacy training material with HIV/AIDS examples were delivered by ICT for Education-trained teachers to HIV/AIDS-oriented NGOs and peer educators accessing the school-based telecentres in the after-school hours.

AIDSWEB worked to enhance links between schools and community NGOS working on HIV/AIDS, and to help students make communication-based connections for future action. For example, a partnership with a Zimbabwean NGO called the Training and Research Support Center (TARSC) has made available an adolescent reproductive health activity pack, "Auntie Stella" (visit the Auntie Stella website, which features 30 question and answer cards based on the letters sent to magazines and radio helplines). In addition, teachers and students at West African Secondary School in Ghana have linked up with AIDS Action Ghana, a national NGO, to train peer educators.

The programme found ways to send teachers, students, and others to relevant conferences. For instance, 30 teachers, NGO, and government project participants attended an HIV/AIDS Materials Review Workshop in Cape Town, South Africa, in July 2001. As a follow-up to this workshop, one teacher from each of the eight participating African countries attended the AIDSWEB D.C. Cultural Exchange Visit in February, 2002. This programme included home stays and school visits with Washington, D.C. teachers (whom they had met at the Cape Town workshop) and a series of informational meetings with a variety of D.C.-based NGO, local, and international institutions. In addition, an HIV/AIDS and ICT Brainstorming Workshop took place in Kampala, Uganda in May, 2002 with representatives from Ministry of Education, Health, school heads, and HIV/AIDS- and youth-oriented NGOs.

AIDSWEB also hosted its own conferences. In October, 2002, an international workshop was held to explore the role of ICT in HIV/AIDS prevention activities. Follow-up activities, like development of pilot projects for online counseling, took place at the local level. Also in 2002, workshops were hosted for youth from 60 schools. Youth-led teams from 38 participating schools produced websites as part of the AIDSWEB Social Action Website Design Competition, which was designed to highlight exemplary examples of school and community HIV/AIDS prevention activities.

HIV/AIDS, Youth, Technology.

In early 2000, 15 schools in Ghana, South Africa, Uganda, and Zimbabwe participated in the project. In 2001, 25 schools - with 200 teacher and student participants - were involved in the online exchange. In a project that ran through May 2002, 30 schools - with about 300 teacher and student participants - enrolled in the project to exchange questions, answers, and discussion via the project's moderated e-mail listserve.

According to the organisers, three-quarters of the 400 ICT for Education Program Internet Learning Centers in Africa are located outside of capital cities. In order to continue to serve rural youth, new technologies such as mobile van telecentres and the use of satellite technology for connecting rural schools with high-speed Internet connectivity are being pilot-tested.

Teachers who have participated in the project report that it has raised awareness of HIV/AIDS issues among their students, enhanced research skills, helped the integration of HIV/AIDS education into school curricula, and helped emphasise the role of the teacher as a facilitator.