Scottish Government

2.2 Examples of peer education

Many examples of peer education were found in PSE and Health Education settings.

2.2.1 Projects administered in schools by external bodies

The Peer Education Project, based in Dundee, set out to reduce the risk to young people through alcohol and drug abuse. It involved S2 pupils working with P7 pupils in cluster primary schools, informing the younger pupils about the risks involved with drugs and alcohol. The project was subjected to an evaluation by an independent agency ⁴. The findings were that participant schools and the schools' neighbouring communities valued the project. It was found that there was potential for increasing the scope of the project to cover wider community issues. In addition, it was established that the peer educators benefitted in a range of ways from their involvement in the project. Their role as volunteers and active citizens had been recognised by others. The evaluation found that there were benefits to the pupils who had been targets in the peer education programme. They were found to be more confident and to have a greater awareness of the risks of drugs and alcohol. It was also concluded that they were better at handling and resisting peer pressure than were pupils of their age who had not been involved in the process of peer education.

Forth Valley's Health Promotion Department developed programmes of peer support in secondary schools across the Board area. It chose smoking prevention as the theme of its peer education programme. An evaluation of the programme, where senior (S5/S6) pupils worked with junior (S1/S2 pupils) found that the peer-led smoking programme had been successful from the point of view of both the educators and key members of school staff. However, it concluded that ⁵:

Despite the belief that a peer led programme would improve the quality of the smoking education offered, junior pupils do not indicate the kinds of shift in attitudes or beliefs in smoking that the programme set out to achieve.

The project did not compare traditional teacher-led with peer-led education but noted that:

In terms of Health Promotion staff perspectives on more traditional forms of delivering Health Education, there is recognition that there may be little difference in terms of material/content of both "traditional" or "peer-led" initiatives, but that the key issue in the method of delivering the message and the ability of younger pupils to engage with the issue in ways which might impact on knowledge, attitude or beliefs.

Both projects described above had the aim of peer educating younger pupils about dangers to their health through drugs, smoking or alcohol. The Dundee project was judged to have achieved its aims, while the Forth Valley project had not. It is not known whether it was the subject matter, the age group targeted or another aspect of the programme that led to this difference.

2.2.2 Advisers' experience of peer education

Interviews held with local authority Advisers yielded a range of information on peer education projects. In one of the authorities, peer education was taking place mostly within PHSE, in informal settings, often in partnership with Community Education. This authority had eight mainstream secondary schools, one of which had developed a peer led health education programme, and there were plans to take this forward in three other secondary schools.

In another authority, peer education was part of its developing health programme, taking place in both secondary and primary schools, with one scheme per "cluster" group. Some initiatives were unique to P7, such as mediation and transition to secondary. In some initiatives, links were set up between S1 and P7. Some long established work in this authority such as drug education took place using peer support. In this authority, one of the aims of peer education was to "convert bystander apathy to bystander empathy". Emotional wellbeing was taken as the central theme to cover a range of issues. The adviser from this authority cautioned against confusing peer education with peer support.

An Adviser in a third authority believed that peer education could range from informal settings, such as drop in lunchtime clubs, through to formal schemes such as paired reading. These could support and then educate young people as required, with the potential to help both educators and their target group. This Adviser believed that peer education centred on a need for approval and acceptance so it would be important to involve educators who had credibility with other pupils. In this authority, there was no scheme that ran across the authority but one secondary school had implemented its own peer education programme. This involved senior pupils (S6) working with younger pupils in the school. This school was followed up and a case study carried out.

Adviser interviewees identified the following benefits of peer education:

• It helped the youngsters trained as peer educators to develop confidence. This would support pupils in work on citizenship, and provide skills and provide opportunities for growth.
• Youngsters at the receiving end had a wider knowledge base from which to tackle problems.
• Teaching staff found it helpful particularly in areas that they were unsure about, as input from pupils could enhance teachers' current knowledge of a topic.

Advisers identified some potential problems in the implementation of peer education programmes. The main problems centred round time available in schools, and these would have an impact on issues such as:

• Training of participants
• Providing peer educators with the skills to deal with potentially sensitive areas
• Good practice guidelines
• Timetabling and articulation with curriculum
• Adaptation of staff members to roles of pupils as "teachers"
• Monitoring or supervision
• Perception of peer education as equally important as orthodox school activities
• Costs involved

The advisers interviewed provided an overview of the main issues connected with peer education. A range of benefits was identified, accruing to all participants (pupil educators, their teachers and the pupils in receipt of the peer education). In the Advisers' experience, there were a number of pre-requisites of successful peer education, and these would make demands on staff and pupil time. Training and adequate supervision or monitoring were the main issues identified. The Advisers saw no reason why peer education should not be applied to RSE but recommended that it should not be developed as a single issue peer education programme, but instead covered within a programme that dealt with a range of issues to do with risk assessment and personal safety.

2.2.3 Schools' experience of peer education

Four schools where peer education was practised were visited in connection with the project. Each school used peer education in different ways. Details of the schools and visits to them are given in Annex 5, but the main features are summarised below.

In School A, the scheme involved pupils from S2 visiting cluster primary schools and working with the P7 pupils in a drug and alcohol education programme. The scheme was managed by a group of community education professionals and the schools had no direct involvement with training and administration of the peer education scheme.

School B operated a number of peer involvement schemes, which covered:

• Peer Support
• Peer Assessment
• Buddying
• Paired Learning
• Peer Education

Buddying, paired learning and peer education took place on a regular basis, and the scheme was administered and managed from within the school.

School C operated both paired reading and buddying systems. The buddying system involved S6 pupils befriending S1 pupils through a formal scheme. Its schemes were managed and administered by teaching staff within the school, but pupils were taken outwith the school to be given initial training and the training team included members of this authority's Educational Psychology Department. The paired reading scheme extended to the large number of pupils in the school who had literacy problems. It was found that even 15 minutes' supported reading per week was beneficial. Older pupils, from S4 upward supported poor readers. This scheme could also be extended to support in other areas, and other academic subjects.

In School D, the peer education scheme under review had been running since 1993 when the Principal Teacher of Behaviour Support had initiated it. In her work with pupils with behavioural support needs, she had discovered that many of them had learning problems and that if they were given appropriate help with their problem subjects, their behaviour improved. As she was not equipped to teach all of the academic subjects (such as Physics, Maths, Latin, English and French) with which her pupils had problems, she recruited pupils with strengths in these subjects to support their learning. S5 pupils were recruited at the end of the summer term and taken for a day's training at the start of their sixth year.

Many examples of peer education were found to exist: their functions, target groups and recruitment varied, and none of the schemes identified by Advisers or operating in schools covered road safety. The following sections explore the characteristics, strengths and weaknesses of generic peer education schemes. Section 3 below explores the potential for, and desirability of, tackling RSE through peer education.