Peer education puts power in hands of teens
What’s a good way to get young people involved in community education about the threat of HIV/AIDS? Make them part of the process, say organizers of an innovative peer education program so successful that it serves as a model for others around the nation.
The Be Active in Self-Education (BASE) Grants Program, founded in 1991 in New York City and administered by the HIV/AIDS Technical Assistance Project of Brooklyn, focuses on student empowerment. With minimal guidance, students serve as grantors, grantees, and program designers for the grants program. A student committee is responsible for writing and issuing requests for student proposals and coordinates a bidder conference to help students write their own program ideas and create successful grant applications. The student committee also decides which projects receive funding and even helps to raise donations for the program.
If these sound like weighty responsibilities, they are. But involving young people in the HIV/AIDS fight is one of the most effective ways to battle the disease, says Peggy Clarke, president of the Research Triangle Park, NC-based American Social Health Association, a nonprofit education, research, and advocacy organization.
"Programs like this have been successful in other behaviorally based areas, but applying it to sexual behavior is so critically important because of the high incidence of infection and high risk-taking in the [teen] population," she says. "I think peer education is so important because it works. We know that particularly for adolescents, the credibility of the messenger is so important in getting across behaviorally based sensitive messages."
How the program works
The New York project covers some 250 high schools and distributes about $70,000 each year, says Azadeh Khalili, executive director for the HIV/AIDS Technical Assistance Project. Through support from foundations and private corporations, the program has funded some 500 student-led HIV/AIDS peer education projects since it was launched by the New York City Public Schools in 1991.
The heart of the BASE grants program is the student advisory committee, explains Khalili. This group, comprising three to five high school students, reviews past programs, evaluates effectiveness, and draws up the applications for projects for the current year. Committee members receive a stipend (roughly $1,000 for their work during the summer and the school year).
By connecting with high schools and other community agencies, the group coordinates the bid conference, where other students can come to learn more about HIV/AIDS programs and submit their applications for BASE grants. The student advisory committee then reviews the requests for funding and makes the decisions on the projects.
Once the projects are funded, they take on a life of their own. For example, a group of students in a large Bronx high school affected by HIV infection has developed an annual AIDS awareness conference. The one-day conference, led by students, offers information for young people on AIDS prevention skills. It has proven so popular that it has been opened to other high school students in the Bronx.
If you are thinking that projects such as the BASE grants program can only happen in New York City, think again, says Gretchen Wooden, MPH, senior program officer with the National AIDS Fund in Washington, DC. The AIDS Fund adopted the BASE model in 1996 for its own program, Students and Philanthropy, funded in six partnership communities: Atlanta, Kansas City, Los Angeles, Minneapolis, Roswell, NM, and San Jose, CA.
Although the BASE model and the Students and Philanthropy program focus on HIV/AIDS education, the message can be adapted to other topics, such as teen pregnancy, says Wooden. The concept is ideal for family planners to use in their own teen community education outreach because it does not involve a lot of money and relies on a teen peer group for its energy.
By approaching one or more community corporations or philanthropic groups for the grant funding, program coordinators can put together the basis of the program. For as little as $7,500, a successful grant program can be implemented in the community.
"Say you have some health educators working with teens in a peer education group, and maybe they’ve gotten bogged down," says Wooden, who administered family planning clinics before coming to the National AIDS Fund. "Maybe they decide it’s time for a new tack, or they need to figure out a new way to get funding for something similar that they have been doing. They can go to the funder and say, We’d like to try to do this project.’ For, say, only $7,500 or $10,000, you can actually have grants made in the community, and students will learn about what is important."
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