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Resource Library The Handbook for Evaluating HIV Education: Booklet 1 Evaluating HIV Education Programs
Introduction
What is HIV education?
AIDS (acquired immunodeficiency syndrome) was identified as a new
clinical condition in 1981, with HIV (human immunodeficiency virus)
discovered as its cause soon after. Since that time, policymakers have
responded in various ways to the crisis. Many educational policymakers
have agreed that schools should provide HIV-related programs to educate
students and help them eliminate, or at least greatly reduce, their
likelihood of becoming infected with HIV. Such HIV education programs
began to be widely offered to students in our nation's schools during the
late 1980s. The fact that HIV infection almost certainly results in
serious illness and premature death, makes the stakes of HIV education
higher than those educators commonly face and the thorough evaluation of
these programs vital. This set of basic guidelines has been designed to
assist in such evaluation.
Many HIV education programs are now available for students at various
grade levels, most often in junior high schools. Sometimes this HIV
education is part of comprehensive school health education. In other
instances, special HIV education programs are inserted into existing
courses, such as psychology, science, or guidance classes. In still other
situations, a separate HIV education program is offered via special
assemblies or minicourses.
Placement within the school curriculum is not the only difference among
HIV education programs; the duration and intensity of these programs vary
as well. In some settings, there is a strong commitment to prepare
students to avoid behaviors that place them at risk of HIV infection. Such
HIV education programs, often provided in the context of comprehensive
school health education, may extend over several weeks and strive to
provide students with a wide range of skills and knowledge with which to
avoid HIV infection. Other HIV education programs are, unfortunately, much
less substantial. These perfunctory programs, lasting no more than an hour
or two, offer students little more than the most rudimentary information
about HIV and preventing its transmission. Return
to top
Why evaluate HIV education?
The common aim of all HIV education programs, regardless of form or
fervor, is to help students avoid becoming infected with HIV. Not every
HIV education program, of course, can successfully protect all students
from HIV infection. It is precisely because of the high stakes already
noted, however, that thorough judgments of a program's success are
particularly important. By systematically evaluating HIV education
programs, we can see whether those programs have been effective.
The five guidelines provided in the following pages are intended to
assist those responsible for evaluating school-based educational programs.
More specifically, these guidelines address program evaluation procedures
to help (1) improve HIV education and (2) determine the success of an HIV
education program. For either of these purposes, program personnel will
make a number of decisions concerning the HIV education program based upon
the information supplied by the program evaluation.
The guidelines in this booklet are deliberately fundamental. They are
intended to assist busy educators who need to evaluate their HIV education
programs efficiently. These guidelines do not deal with advanced aspects
of program evaluation; numerous textbooks are available that provide
sophisticated treatments of such topics. A set of references is included
at the end of this booklet for those interested in further pursuing the
topic of program evaluation.
This booklet presumes that you, the reader, need to conduct or oversee
the evaluation of an HIV education program. These guidelines address key
procedural steps that you can follow in carrying out an appropriate
evaluation. They deal specifically with fundamentals—the nuts and bolts
of evaluating HIV education. Only rarely will you find discussions of
possible procedural alternatives. To keep this booklet brief enough to be
read and used by busy people, the guidelines more often than not embody
"do this, then that" procedural suggestions.
Back to Booklet 1 Table of Contents Back
to Handbook for Evaluating HIV Education - Introduction |
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