Half of HIV infected persons worldwide are within the 15 to 25 age bracket and India is no different. Teenagers are particularly vulnerable during their phases of physical and psychological development, as they are unsure of their emotions and sexuality. Sexual issues in India carry the 'untouchable' tag both in school and at home, which leaves youngsters confronting a gaping vacuum in their moments of physical uncertainty and emotional confusion. Adolescent Sexual Health Education has endeavored to fill this void through a sexual education program for adolescents in schools and colleges in India.

Mr. Sunil Dutt (famed actor & politician) inaugurates the ASHE PROJECT

The program uses a well-researched, interactive curriculum that places emphasis on character building, abstinence, and life skills while highlighting the urgency for protection from AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases. The curriculum has been used to great effect in educating young people to make intelligent and informed choices. The uniqueness of lies in the use of a monitoring tool that has been carefully designed to ensure a continuous process of evaluation at every stage.

Currently, a total of 50,000 students are using the curriculum. 30 teachers training workshops have been conducted and 1640 teachers have been trained in 306 schools. The program has expanded into schools in seventeen districts of Karnataka. After completion of the three year project the plan is to go national with the program.

ASHA Foundation also networked with many other agencies that are working with adolescents such as MYRADA, GRIDO, Yuv Chetna, Seventh day Adventists, and Methodist church of India, Bangalore University, REDS, Don Bosco, and INSA etc.

ASHA foundation aims to use the program to help students build their character and develop life skills while educating them on the purposes of sex and its physical, emotional, social, mental and spiritual ramifications. Abstinence from sex is greatly stressed upon with a view to eliminate the risk of AIDS rather than on decreasing the risk.
After the three year project was completed in Dec 2 006, an external evaluation was performed in February - March 2007. Following is the summary of the findings.

EXTERNAL EVALUATION

Teachers training workshop being conducted by AF staff in a school hall of a school in Gulbarga, Karnataka

Administrative and Procedural: The goal, vision, and mission of ASHA Foundation been successfully realized in the process of empowering the adolescents in relation to the issues they face. Planning, Monitoring and Evaluation systems are in place and effective. Structure, organizational management, implementationof the program under the facilitation of the NGO has been successful. Procedure of democracy and transparency in project operation has been strictly adhered to. Effective team work, cooperation, coordination, leadership, group dynamics, conceptual clarity, division of work, roles and responsibilities in the team,ability of trainers to train the

teachers in both character building and in the medical section, knowledge, skills and capacity of the resource team of ASHA Foundation in carrying out the activities and reaching out to the target group were found to be adequate. Reporting, decision making and participatory approach in the project found to be efficient. The intended number of teacher participants, students, training sessions, workshops was all adhered to despite several obstacles faced when a trained teacher had left.

Training programme:
More than the decided number of Teachers’ Training workshops was conducted, which enhanced the program with good distribution of teachers. Feedback from the teachers & students was very positive.
Training has been able to make the teachers have enough faith to carry on the programme independently without leaning on ASHA Foundation to carry out LAC. Training materials and processes are appropriate with numerous aids and a variety of activities. Support from ASHA was good as expressed by the teachers who were interviewed. Team teaching was also encouraged. The schools were able to carry out the training without further input from ASHA Foundation, as the training workshops were adequate and complete. Feedback received from teachers was very positive in the written reports as well as at the interviews.

Impartial Approach:
The program was conducted across various kinds of schools formal and informal, urban and semi-urban, elite schools and regular schools, schools differing according to different course curriculum, and those students among the marginalized. The perceived impact of the program was higher among students from middle and lower family income levels than others. Types of schools covering differing groups is commendable, more so as the intended impact was achieved. Teachers also expressed that the ideas of value education, relationships in the family were not easy to deal with. They took up the difficult task and found results of their effort gratifying. Teachers and students mentioned that paper work was not a burden. Rural children expressed that they were ready to receive more. Simple as they are, they are open to take in more. Stakeholders felt conceptual clarity and coordinated well, quite often adapting themselves to the situations. They accepted the challenge to reach out.

Programme result and Feedback:
Participants voiced that the significant learning from the program included taking responsibility, management of peer pressure and value clarification. Findings of the dialogue with stakeholders revealed that the teachers, heads of institutions, parents and significant others were very happy with the program and the perceived impact was very high. The unbiased inclusion of various types of schools covering differing groups is commendable, more so as the intended impact was achieved. The programme has been extremely successful as the tables above manifest. Point 13, 14,. The lengthy programme being carried out with very often just one period at hand, to completion is indicative of the success of the programme. Teachers, students and parents have all given feedback as to the benefits of the programme. Teachers realized their strengths and weaknesses as expressed in the interviews. Some schools did not follow the Action Plans as prescribed for want of time. Had it been completely followed it would have enhanced students’ gain. Quite a lot of follow up has been done and more could be achieved with more volunteers.

life skills while educating them on the purposes of sex and its physical, emotional, social, mental and spiritual ramifications. Abstinence from sex is greatly stressed upon with a view to eliminate the risk of AIDS rather than on decreasing the risk. The program is now being scaled up and moving out of Karnataka and in the next three years the focus is on Mumbai and Pune. 90 schools and 10, 000 students is the target. The program is also going on in parts of Orissa, Simla, Kolkatta and Visakapatnam