A SMS based game on mobile phones has been deployed with a marginalised group of Peer Educators in Kolkata, India. This group is called Males having Sex with Males (MSM) and are a core part of HIV prevention strategy in higher at risk groups in India. The SMS game endeavoured to simulate real life (outreach) work experiences of the MSM Peer Educators.
At the start of the project the research question was, "Can we design and evaluate an effective learning support for Peer Educators of the MSM community using mobile game based learning?" and the specific objectives of the study were:
1. To explore peer education and identify the key learning needs of the Peer Educators
2. To use a participatory process to design and pilot the game as a learning intervention
3. To implement the SMS based intervention amongst a group of Peer Educators.
4. To evaluate whether the SMS text based game had any impact on:
a. learning needs identified by the Peer Educators
b. processes and practices of peer education
5. To evaluate the SMS game
Has the project been able to achieve what it was set to do?