Peer education is considered as a health promotion and intervention strategy. Peer education programmes target the peer group as the unit of change in order to change social norms and use an individual from the target group (i.e. ‘peer educator’ or ‘peer facilitator’) as the agent of change.

CSPE wants to ‘promote the development of knowledge, attitudes, beliefs, and skills that will enable young people to engage in healthy behaviors and improve their reproductive and sexual health outcomes – i.e. prevent unintended pregnancies, STIs and HIV. Facilitated by peers who come from similar backgrounds, HIV prevention peer education programs recognize the important role peers play in influencing young people’s behaviour’.

While it is important that peer education programmes focus on prevention, it is also important to understand the psychosocial needs of youth and to foster character, resilience and access to real supports and safety nets for them to deal with their vulnerable life contexts. However, peer education programs and their intentions are not always well-planned and sometimes do not reach their objectives of long-lasting behaviour change.

The problems associated with this are often reflective of the programme’s inability to follow standard guidelines for effective peer education. In this regard, Rutanang, a multiyear collaborative effort produced guidelines for peer education agreed upon as the standard for peer education in South Africa by a wide range of stakeholder groups. Rutanang is a framework of what peer education might be and the programme structures and mechanisms it requires to be effective.

Fundamental to successful implementation of any peer education program is consensus about goals, essential elements and guidelines of peer education, including the roles expected of peer educators. According to Rutanang, peer education is the process whereby trained supervisors assist a diverse group of youth to:

  1. Educate their peers in a structured manner.
  2. Recognise youth in need of additional help and refer them for assistance.
  3. Informally influence by modelling serious thinking, healthy behaviour.
  4. Advocate for gender equity, resources and services for themselves and their peers.

In addition Rutanang advocates ten standards that should characterise programs:

  1. Planning: Is there a detailed plan of action, based on actual needs with clear, measurable goals?
  2. Mobilising: Is there commitment, understanding and support from the leadership of the school/higher education institution/community in which you are working? Are there shared vision, structure and resources?
  3. Supervisor infrastructure: Have supervisors been carefully selected, trained and contracted?
  4. Linkages: Have you included the partners and support structures you need for your program?
  5. Learning program: Is your learning program an effective, tested, ‘beyond awareness’ program, delivering adequate dosage in an appropriate sequence, making use of interactive methodologies?
  6. Peer educator infrastructure: Have peer educators been carefully selected, trained and contracted, with clearly defined roles, performance standards and graduated responsibilities?
  7. Management: Are peer educators and supervisors well managed and is the delivery of all four roles of peer education quantifiable and happening effectively?
  8. Recognition and credentialing: Are there credentialing and reward mechanisms in place to ensure growth, development and advancement opportunities for peer educators and for supervisors?
  9. Monitoring and evaluation: Do you have a realistic monitoring and evaluation plan that includes documentation and information management?
  10. Sustainability: Do you have a practical and operative sustainability plan dealing with compliance, public relations, staffing, funding and peer ownership?