Education is key to preventing the spread of HIV. But while sex education in Uganda covers effectively the biology of HIV, it fails to prompt behaviour change. Action research from Birmingham University, undertaken in Uganda, engaged pupils in choosing the content and delivery of the curriculum in an attempt to fulfil this need.

Sex education is included within the Uganda curriculum, but not as a topic on its own. Lessons are teacher-centred and emphasise abstaining from sex until marriage and shunning homosexuality. Structured questionnaires, focus group discussions and personal accounts reveal that pupils see these lessons as boring, irrelevant and a waste of time.

The action research in the classroom aimed to empower 14 and 15-year-olds by involving them in the planning and evaluation of the AIDS curriculum. The research used the national curriculum theme of ‘growing up’, but allowed flexibility. Classes involved games, stories and active participation. Ground-rules, ensuring that pupils would respect and listen to each other, challenged inequalities in the class. There was a shift in emphasis in the curriculum from the science of AIDS, which young people find boring and at times frightening, to their lived sexual experience, including:

• homosexuality, homophobia and the pressure to confirm to heterosexual behaviour
• relationships
• communication skills.

Where these changes have taken place, pupils find the sessions fun. They like the use of small, single-sex groups for discussions and learning about sexual issues. Boys and girls participate actively in the discussions. They feel they have more respect and control in the classroom and that there are fewer incidents of sexual harassment.

In a later second study, a group of fifty 17 to 19-year-olds at an urban mixed boarding school chose not only the curriculum, but also the methods of learning. They were allowed to decide what and how to learn using mobile sexual health clinic sessions and peer-led support groups. The clinics provided reading materials and videos about sexual health and involved professionals, such as counsellors, teachers, doctors, health educators and radio programmers. The six-member peer groups discussed habits such as use of alcohol, drugs and going to nightclubs.

Some students attended the mobile sexual health clinic sessions, while others prefered peer-led social support groups. Students also showed different preferences for the content of AIDS education. Positive outcomes of giving students power over the content and format of these sessions include:

• More students attended the mobile sexual health clinic sessions.
• Half of students at one session said they would like to take an HIV test.
• There is increased awareness about the use of condoms.
• Students request more education on social skills.
• Attitudes to gender relations have improved.

This research shows that young people’s involvement in curriculum content and delivery improves their response to AIDS education. However, the researcher notes that the source of many injustices lies beyond the school boundary and that challenging them in the classroom alone will not stop them.

Source(s):
‘AIDS and democratic education in Uganda’ Comparative Education 38 (3): 291-302, by R. Miremba, 2002

Funded by: World Bank/Sexually Transmitted Infection Project Uganda

id21 Research Highlight: 20 December 2005

Further Information:
Robina Mirembe
King’s College Budo
PO Box 7121
Kampala
Uganda

Tel: +256 273 993
Fax: +256 273 993
Contact the contributor: r.mirembe@infocom.co.ug

Kings' College Budo, Uganda

Other related links:
'Growing threat: HIV and adolescents in Ethiopia'

'Meeting the sexual health needs of young people in northern Uganda'

'Clearing up confusion: peer-led AIDS education in Zambia'

'HIV/AIDS education needs strengthening in Namibian schools'

'Timetable for change: effective HIV education in Asian schools'

'Deadly silence: barriers to communicating HIV/AIDS in schools'

'A tale of four cities: does general education affect the risk of HIV?'