NEW YORK, NY (November 4, 2021) – CAI announced today that the National HIV Classroom Learning Center (NHCLC) has conducted more than 150 virtual trainings since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, providing training to more than 1,500 HIV service providers. This milestone reflects CAI’s unique expertise in developing and implementing live, virtual training programs in the public health sector.
The NHCLC, which is funded by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), trains HIV service providers on CDC-supported, evidence-based interventions and public health strategies that promote HIV diagnosis, treatment, prevention, and outbreak response, all to support goals outlined in the federal government’s strategy, Ending the HIV Epidemic in the U.S.
At the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic in late February 2020, CAI and the CDC made the decision to cancel all in-person NHCLC trainings and began planning and implementing activities needed to convert prioritized courses to a live, online, synchronous training modality. The work of transitioning from in-person to live, virtual training included identifying and selecting a training platform, upgrading software, building staff capacity to design and deliver highly interactive synchronous training, initiating a curriculum conversion process, and defining a sequence of internal quality assurance processes to assess and refine the conversions and prepare trainers.
The NHCLC has also surpassed CDC benchmarks in metrics related to course conversion (classroom to virtual) and learner engagement. An NHCLC report shows 83% of learners successfully completing trainings with a 96% satisfaction rate. One participant commented: “This is the best online Zoom training I have been involved in. There was the right amount of engagement at all times.”
“During this time of uncertainty, it would have been easy to fall into despair. But the entire CAI team acted without hesitation to support our allies in the field and develop new training tools to protect the health of the public. I feel honored to work with such committed professionals during this difficult time,” said NHCLC Director Miguel Chion.
The NHCLC is a five-year collaboration between CAI and the CDC that started in 2019. The NHCLC is a national project working in the areas hit hardest by HIV to increase the capacity of HIV service providers and agencies to implement interventions that can reduce the impact of HIV and curb the number of new infections.