Higher education institutions are both a resource and a prime target for peer education. The simple concentration of young people, and the combination of structured and informal opportunities for them to meet and socialize in the absence of adult and community constraints, and often in the presence of intoxicating substances, encourages multiple and serial sexual partners. On the other hand, the literacy and habits of mind of those who go on to further education make students more approachable and more receptive to health messages.

Peer educators on campus can participate in a broad range of educational activities including drama and other group activities, social events, condom and materials distribution, and media exposure. The availability of testing and counseling for STIs, including HIV/AIDS, and the proximity of dedicated health services for depression and other mental health issues related to grieving, makes the recognition and referral role of PEs both critical and feasible. Since peer educators typically live amongst other students, the opportunities for them to exert informal influence and affect social norms is enhanced.

In addition to providing high quality peer education intervention programs for their own students, institutions of higher education can contribute to a more rigorous practice of PE by:

• Engaging in new models of community partnership
  Universities can serve as training grounds for "master PEs". Beyond direct facilitation of peer education groups on campus, university-based PEs can be leveraged to train more PEs in different settings (e.g. schools). This model not only extends the reach of peer education training provided in universities, but also creates opportunities for universities to reinvest in surrounding communities.
• Research and evaluation
  The research literature on peer education is appallingly thin. In implementing peer education programs, universities have excellent opportunities to secure funds to better understand what works, why it works, and what it requires and costs.
• Accrediting peer education
  One of the critical contributions universities can make to the quality and sustainability of peer education programs at every level — school, community, and higher education — is to establish and administer an accreditation system. Such a system, delineating career pathways and gradations of accomplishment and advancement for peer educators and their supervisors, would help to establish and validate performance standards for new and experienced peer educators with differing levels of prior education and academic skills; encourage excellence and persistence in peer educators and build more rigorous and sustainable peer education programs; and it would help channel able individuals into careers in health and education.

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