The Health Education and Adult Literacy: Breast and Cervical Cancer Project (HEAL:BCC) is a unique collaboration between the fields of public health and adult education. Adult Learning Centers directly serve adults with limited literacy skills, a population traditional public health education programs often fail to reach. The goals of HEAL:BCC are: 1) to increase early detection and screening for breast and cervical cancer among women with less than a high school education and 2) to promote healthful action in the community by providing adult learners with the information and skills needed to take action for themselves and to help others. HEAL:BCC is a project of World Education funded by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
HEAL:BCC is designed to support Adult Learning Centers in their primary goal of helping learners improve their reading, writing, and oral presentation skills while at the same time introducing health content. Components of the HEAL:BCC include an orientation, a teacher training, a center resource box, the HEAL:BCC Curriculum, on-going support for teachers, materials for learners, and a final project event. Linkages to health care services are critical to success.
The HEAL:BCC model is being evaluated on the center level, classroom level, and community level. Over the past two years, HEAL:BCC materials and processes were piloted with nine Adult Learning Centers. Lessons learned along with preliminary outcome findings from the pilot will be presented. A discussion of the essential components to a successful health education collaboration with Adult Learning Centers will follow.
Learning Objectives: Following this presentation, participants will be able to: 1) Articulate the benefits of incorporating health content in Adult Basic Education (ABE) and English for speakers of other languages (ESOL) classes. 2) Identify strategies for evaluating the effectiveness of health education programs implemented in Adult Learning Centers. 3) Describe the necessary components to a successful health education collaboration between Adult Learning Centers and public health advocates
Keywords: Health Education, Underserved Populations
Presenting author's disclosure statement:
Organization/institution whose products or services will be discussed: HEAL:BCC is a project of World Education funded by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
I have a significant financial interest/arrangement or affiliation with any organization/institution whose products or services are being discussed in this session.
Relationship: Presenter is employed by World Education, a non-profit organization.