TeenWeb - Nairobi

The TeenWeb project combined social and scientific goals to maximise benefits and explore new paths for global learning and exchange on matters of adolescent health. The project offered "research subjects" computer skills in exchange for their cooperation over a two-year period. Instead of the traditional t-shirt or key chain incentive, students in the TeenWeb study received benefits in the form of digital information-transfer.

As students finished answering the questions presented in each of a series of five modules, they were given the option of learning about health via the Internet. Websites featured content from You, Your Life, Your Dreams: A Book for Adolescents by Family Care International. At the end of the project, the computers were donated to the schools.

Students in the control schools did not have Internet access, and only answered questions at the beginning and end of the study via traditional paper questionnaires. Questions were the same as those presented to students in web schools, but of more limited scope. Control schools were given electronics (TV or VCR) in exchange for their participation.

Health, Youth, Technology

The project was aimed at helping the Kenyan youth bridge the barriers that prevented them from gaining access to information and services that can help them understand their sexuality and protect them from the health consequences of risky behaviours. It also aimed to systematically offer young people the factual information and skills that they need to make healthy, life-enhancing choices.