"I felt like I was going to cause conflict. So, I kept quiet " (Female child rape victim, 15 years).

BACKGROUND: There is limited research in South Africa that has analysed the experiences of child and youth victims of crime and sexual victimisation who accessed formal response services through the victim empowerment programme. OBJECTIVE: The primary aim of this article is to explore children and youth's experiences of accessing the Victim Empowerment Programmatic services, through the criminal justice system in South Africa. The focus of the article is on childrens' disclosure, reporting and social support. PARTICIPANTS AND SETTING: The participants in the study are male and female victim/survivor of crime between the ages of 12-17 years who has been through a Victim Empowerment Programme (VEP) for at least 12 months. The Victim Empowerment Programme is a governmental programme located within the National Department of Social Development in South Africa. METHOD: The full study is a mixed method study but the children's(youth) participation in the study is limited to qualitative methods. The data analysis utilised a thematic approach and ATLAS.ti software. RESULTS: The findings revealed four themes, namely, (1) children's (as youth) perceptions of the presence and frequency of rape in communities, (2) disclosure and reporting rape; (3) interlinkage of disclosure and reporting of child rape and child sexual victimisation; and (4) seeking social and professional support to deal with the trauma of child (youth) rape and child sexual victimisation. The findings showed that children (youth) perceive their community environments as unsafe spaces where they are exposed to crimes such as rape and burglary; that there are delays in disclosure of sexual victimisation and victims/survivors are still dealing with the trauma of rape as they report the crime and navigate the pathways of the criminal justice system. CONCLUSION: In conclusion, this study confirms the delay in disclosure of childhood (youth) sexual victimisation and identifies the complex tension for children (youth) who disclose, that they are often pressured to report the crime, and journey through an adversarial criminal justice system, and so 'breaking the silence' is often unpredictable and emotionally and psychologically costly for children and youth.

Ensuring an optimal environment for peer education in South African schools: Goals, systems, standards and policy options for effective learning.

Peer education has long been seen as a key health promotion strategy and an important tool in preventing HIV infection. In South African schools, it is currently one of the strategies employed to do so. Based on both a recent research study of peer education across 35 schools and drawing on multiple previous studies in South Africa, this paper examines the key elements of peer education that contribute to its effectiveness and asks how this aligns with current educational and health policies. From this research, it summarises and proposes shared goals and aims, minimum standards of implementation and reflects on the necessary infrastructure required for peer education to be effective. In light of these findings, it offers policy recommendations regarding who should be doing peer education and the status peer education should have in a school's formal programme.

Addressing adolescents' risk and protective factors related to risky behaviours: Findings from a school-based peer-education evaluation in the Western Cape.

BACKGROUND: Peer-education programmes aim to bring about attitudinal and behavioural changes in their target audience. In the South African educational context, peer education is a favoured approach in dealing with issues such as HIV and AIDS, sexual decision-making and substance misuse. Given the reliance on peer-education programmes in the educational system, it is important to establish how well they are working. This study aims to assess the effect of an extensive, structured, time-limited, curriculum-based, peer-led educational programme on first-year high school learners in public schools in the Western Cape Province of South Africa. METHOD: The curriculum called 'Listen Up' addresses issues such as supporting peers, sexual decision-making, healthy relationships, HIV risk, alcohol misuse and unwanted pregnancy in seven structured sessions. The programme targeted adolescents in Grade 8 growing up in what are considered to be risky environments in public schools in the Western Cape during 2012 and 2013. The intervention was evaluated based on 10 scales sourced from published literature related to the outcome indicators of future orientation, sensation-seeking, self-efficacy in sexual relations, HIV transmission knowledge, HIV prevention knowledge, HIV attitudes, sexual attitudes, decision-making, healthy relationships and social support. Descriptive statistics were used to analyse demographic and community characteristics and analyses of variance were used to detect differences between groups. The surveys were administered to a total of 7709 learners across three waves of the study in 27 peer intervention schools and eight control schools. RESULTS: Immediately post intervention, statistically significant differences were noted for the intervention schools when compared to their baseline levels on measures of future orientation, self-efficacy in sexual relations, knowledge regarding HIV transmission, knowledge regarding HIV prevention and knowledge in terms of healthy relationships. Comparing baseline values with results collected between five and seven months post intervention, statistically significant results were noted for self-efficacy in sexual relations and knowledge regarding HIV transmission. CONCLUSION: The findings of this study suggest that peer-education can improve adolescents' self-efficacy in sexual relations as well as knowledge regarding the transmission of HIV and therefore can contribute to the prevention of HIV transmission among adolescents.