Life Education Australia (Life Ed) is the largest and most recognised health education provider in Australian schools. Life Ed reaches on average 700,000 children annually where qualified educators present evidence-based preventative health and wellbeing education, along with Healthy Harold, the giraffe puppet and mascot who is the face of the organisation.
Life Education Australia began in 1979, in The Wayside Chapel in
Kings Cross by Reverend Ted Noffs, who used his experience with religion to focus on an action-based approach as opposed to preaching.
In 2016, the program began to teach topics of illicit drug use like
methamphetamine
Methamphetamine (contracted from ) is a potent central nervous system (CNS) stimulant that is mainly used as a recreational drug use, recreational or Performance-enhancing substance, performance-enhancing drug and less commonly as a secon ...
, in response to rising narcotics usage rates in Australia. In 2017, the Australian government announced plans to defund the program, but this was not implemented after public backlash. The in-person program was temporary halted and moved online due to restrictions placed by the Australian government in response to the
COVID-19 pandemic
The COVID-19 pandemic (also known as the coronavirus pandemic and COVID pandemic), caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), began with an disease outbreak, outbreak of COVID-19 in Wuhan, China, in December ...
, but resumed on October 13, 2020.
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References
External links
Life Education Australia Website
Health education in Australia
Law enforcement in Australia
History of drug control
1979 establishments in Australia