This paper focuses on the use of ethnographic methods as a way of linking teaching and research through sport-in-development student placements with sport-based Non-governmental Organisations in Africa. The key focus is on using ethnographic methods to collect data by way of field notes and diaries and use the data for student dissertations as well as for HIV intervention sport program improvement in international development. Students that are engaged in these placements can contribute towards knowledge generation in the field of sport and development and at the same time the acquired problem-solving skills and the ability to undertake own empirical research become valuable for their future work in the UK. Being a student-focused exercise, the paper explains the key areas in the preparation of UK students for their voluntary work using sport as a tool for HIV/AIDS preventative education. It highlights the use of Dunking AIDS Out (DAO) (Banda and Mwaanga 2008) a basketball HIV intervention program in HIV prevention as an instrument to enable ethnographic means of collecting data. Apart from gathering data for process evaluation, monitoring and evaluation (Backett-Milburn and Wilson, 2000; Hong et al. 2005) of the HIV intervention program so as to make interventions reflect the real social world of the youths and ensure that the interventions are culturally appropriate, the students are also entitled to use the data for their final year dissertation if they chose to.

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