Teachers and Teaching: Teaching Undergraduates about AIDS: An Action-Oriented Approach

Abstract

Since 1981, over 100,000 Americans have died from AIDS. More than 1.5 million others are infected with HIV, the virus believed to cause AIDS. Schools and colleges across the country have responded to the AIDS epidemic by providing a variety of education and risk-reduction programs for their students. In this article, Kimberly Christensen describes the content and pedagogy of an action-oriented, semester-long undergraduate course she taught on AIDS at the State University of New York College at Purchase in the spring of 1990. It is her view that educators must not only teach risk-reduction behavior, but also explore the deeper causes of the AIDS epidemic:the social forces that grant differential access to information, health care, and social services for people of different race, gender, sexual orientation, and social class. Furthermore, she suggests that successful AIDS educational efforts should also be designed to help students combat their pervasive feelings of powerlessness by actively involving them in efforts to end the AIDS crisis. In this article, Christensen provides a critique and evaluation of the content and pedagogy of the course, shares her students' reactions to the class, and makes suggestions for designing similar courses.