Youth Education Initiative - Taima TB Youth Education Initiative

Project Overview:

The Taima TB Youth Education Initiative (YEI) aimed to expand and increase awareness of TB in Inuit communities by equipping community health care providers, youth workers, and educators with tools to help them provide youth with TB knowledge and to improve uptake in preventative behaviours. It was a multi-faceted education campaign to help empower youth with TB knowledge and to improve uptake in preventative behaviours.  This initiative was also aimed at strengthening and formalizing the governance, community engagement, and knowledge translation foundations for TB research in Inuit communities laid during the original Taima TB-Iqaluit project.  Inclusive research governance, community engagement, and knowledge translation form the foundation of all Taima TB research projects.  This knowledge translation supplement to the original Taima TB-Iqaluit project formalized these processes and tested them through the expansion of the project to additional communities.

The core of the Taima TB Youth Education Initiative is a knowledge translation project that built on the TB awareness principles and messaging of the original Taima TB-Iqaluit project.  Current epidemiology of TB disease in Canada as well as consultation with community members during the Taima TB-Iqaluit project indicated a gap in TB education among Inuit youth.  Existing literatureand the experience gained through the original project both showed that multi-faceted interventions are an effective approach to knowledge translation strategies, as is the importance of tailoring to local contexts. The Taima TB-Iqaluit project used several vehicles to disseminate knowledge.  Based on evidence generated by that project, the most effective of these vehicles were further developed for this knowledge translation project. The following four activities made up the core of the Taima TB Youth Education Initiative:

  1. Youth Learning Activities
  2. Video Challenge
  3. Community Event
  4. Dissemination and ongoing use of videos

The Taima TB Youth Education Initiative field tested a set of learning stations in four Nunavut communities.  These activities are designed to teach about TB in a way that relates directly to the lives of youth.  The learning activities include hearing the stories of community members who have had TB, learning about how the lungs work by handling models and lungs from a freshly hunted animal, drama sketches, and games.  The young people participating shared what they learned by making educational videos about TB for the whole community.  Follow the links below to see the learning activities and videos developed through this project:

Published Manuscript

Developing and Field Testing a Community Based Youth Initiative to Increase Tuberculosis Awareness in Remote Arctic Inuit Communities

Taima TB Learning Activities Facilitator Manual

Taima TB Youth Education Initiative Facilitators Manual – 22 Jan 2015

TB Education Lesson Plans

TB Learning Videos

Tune in to the Taima TB Youtube channel to see the education videos created by the youth as part of the Taima TB-Iqaluit and Taima TB Youth Education Initiative.