E-Learning and North-South collaboration: the experience of two public health schools in France and Benin.

Introduction: Distance learning (e-learning) can facilitate access to training. Yet few public health E-learning experiments have been reported; institutes in developing countries experience difficulties in establishing on-line curricula, while developed countries struggle with adapting existing curricula to realities on the ground. In 2005, two schools of public health, one in France and one in Benin, began collaborating through contact sessions organised for Nancy University distance-learning students.

[Development and experimentation of a health promotion and health education module in the context of an on-line distance learning programme].

The article presents the evolution of a health promotion and health education training module within the contexts of the development of a new on-line learning programme. Relying upon validated theoretical models, each step of the module's development is explicitly described, from the needs assessment phase to the experimental one. A detailed needs assessment brings to light the limitations of a traditional distance-learning module with regard to the very specific needs of students.