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ETR Associates has been leading the way in HIV education
since the first days of the AIDS epidemic. In the early
1980’s, we published articles offering guidance and
information about AIDS to teachers and schools. We
advocated that children with AIDS attend schools with
other students at a time when communities all over the
country grappled with this issue.
We published some of the first pamphlets about AIDS for
teens and their parents, for sexually active adults and for
injection drug users and their partners. In 1986, we
published one of the first nationally distributed AIDS
curricula for high school students—a move some
organizations considered risky because at the time,
being associated with AIDS in any way was potentially
controversial.
Our Training Department successfully bid for and
implemented one of the first CDC grants to promote HIV/AIDS
education in schools. Project staff authored the first training
manual on this subject, Training Educators in HIV Prevention.
When the Smithsonian
Institution’s National
Museum of American
History recently established a
collection of HIV education
materials, they asked ETR to
donate copies of their early
AIDS/HIV related books and
pamphlets. These materials will
remain in the permanent
collection and be made available to
historians and scholars researching the
earliest days of the epidemic in America.
We are honored to be recognized by the Smithsonian and included in this important collection.
We are grateful to ETR’s founders and early leaders for their fearlessness in addressing such
topics, and their absolute willingness to lead the way because it was the right thing to do.
Making history in HIV education
ETR materials added to Smithsonian Institution’s
early HIV education collection
Teaching AIDS
One of the first nationally
distributed AIDS curricula
In the mid-1980’s, schools didn’t know
how to teach their students about AIDS.
There was no coherent national strategy for
communities. There was a lot of confusion.
ETR’s early leaders were fearless
on this. They already had a strong
foundation in sexuality education.
They understood what the messaging
about AIDS needed to be. They
leapt right in and led the way.
We’ve all benefitted from their
commitment and vision.
Marcia Quackenbush
Author, Teaching AIDS
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