Uganda

The Peace Corps/Uganda program was reestablished in 2000, after its suspension in 1999. Peace Corps has a longstanding commitment to the country's development and has experienced excellent relationships with the people of Uganda throughout the years. Currently, Peace Corps/Uganda has an education project and a community health project.

All Peace Corps Volunteers in Uganda are currently engaged in HIV/AIDS activities either as part of their primary or secondary projects. Volunteer activities include youth groups, life skills workshops, workshops for teachers on health education, teaching nutrition for people living with AIDS, peer education training, and developing school assembly messages as part of the Ugandan Presidential Initiative on AIDS Strategy for Communication to Youth.

Sub-Saharan Africa is home to 70 percent of the world's HIV and AIDS cases. Uganda has shown progress in reducing HIV prevalence rate from about 30 percent to about 6 percent in slightly more than a decade.

The education project assigns teacher-trainer Volunteers to various core primary teacher colleges around the country. Their working sites are at rural coordinating centers, working closely with Ugandan coordinating center tutors.

Volunteers and tutors work together to organize and provide the in-service training necessary to upgrade the skills and abilities of primary school teachers in each coordinating center's catchments area.

Skills such as health extension, environmental education, information technology, youth development, and sustainable agriculture allow Volunteers to explore ways to enhance school and community views of one another, which helps develop the school as a community resource and vice versa.

Volunteers provide assistance to rural government health clinics and small community-based organizations, nongovernmental organizations, and faith-based organizations.

These organizations have requested assistance in building capacity to plan and implement such activities as establishing counseling and testing services for HIV/AIDS; providing HIV/AIDS homecare services; raising vaccination awareness; implementing school and community health education programs, particularly addressing HIV/AIDS prevention and awareness; and developing nutrition-, hygiene- and sanitation-oriented projects, particularly aimed at families and communities affected by HIV/AIDS.

Last updated Sep 28 2008