Introduction

Introduction to the HIV/AIDS Electronic Library

Produced by IICBA

This Electronic Library is intended for teachers and teacher trainers throughout Africa, yet the information can also be used by teachers around the world. The focus is on youth with an emphasis on the need for HIV/AIDS preventative education to be implemented in the schools starting at grade three. According to UNAIDS:

"Prevention and health promotion programmes should begin at the earliest possible age, and certainly before the onset of sexual activity. They should reach students before most of them leave or drop out of school, particularly in countries where girls tend to leave at a younger age. This means that age-appropriate programmes should start at primary school level."

Integrating HIV/STD Prevention into the school setting, UNAIDS;
August 1997

The purpose of this Electronic Library is to give access to new, up-to-date and useful materials that will assist in learning and teaching about HIV/AIDS, and, in particular, about the devastating effect that the epidemic is having on Africa. Although Africa is experiencing the largest percentage of HIV/AIDS infections in the world, HIV/AIDS is a global problem and it is important for students, in particular African students, to be aware that the epidemic is global in scope. Therefore the included materials are comprehensive and cover a wide variety of topics surrounding HIV/AIDS. Teachers, teacher-trainers and students alike can benefit from the information contained in this Electronic Library

It is our hope that teachers and teacher trainers will see the urgent need to integrate HIV/AIDS education across their entire curriculum, and will realize that there is a place for teaching about HIV/AIDS in every lesson, and for every subject. This Electronic Library contains lesson plans for grades 3-12, curriculum guides, visuals, information and facts sheets about the disease, scientific information, development information and statistics, among many other important documents.

The materials have been gathered from a wide variety of sources in Africa and worldwide from Internet and communications via e-mail. The materials have been categorized in such a way that it should be easy for the user of this Electronic Library to access the information that they need quickly and efficiently. Also, the user can "browse" through the information and may come across documents which will be useful for their personal knowledge and professional development.

The Electronic Library also contains information on policies that have been implemented in some African countries that are allowing education systems to play an important role in fighting against HIV/AIDS.

We would like to thank all of the people and organizations who contributed helped us with this electronic library, in particular UNAIDS, WHO, UNESCO, UNICEF, the New York Times, CNN, Gary Hopkins at Education World, Dick Schoech at the University of Texas, Sue Cohen, Michael Kelly, and Annette Guveya. We would also like to acknowledge the generosity of many organizations that provided us with sources of information from around the world. We would like to thank Henok Workne and Mulualem Seyoum for the technical assistance with the Electronic Library. This Electronic Library was compiled by Allyson Wainer, a consultant to UNESCO-IICBA, September 2001 under the direction of Dr. Fay Chung, Director of IICBA.