Diane Allensworth

Schools as Agents for Achieving the 1990 Health Objectives for the Nation

This article clarifies the capacity of the nations public schools to act as powerful and effective agents to facilitate attainment of the 1990 Health Objectives for the Nation. Of the health promotion and disease prevention objectives established by the Department of Health and Human Services in 1980, Iverson and Kolbe have identified 67 that can be achieved directly or indirectly through comprehensive school health programming. This process, however, can best be expedited by expanding the tradi tional definition of comprehensive school health from one that includes health instruc tion, health services, and a healthful school environment coordinated by a school/ community health council to one that integrates additional programs and resources already in existence in most school and community environments: the physical educa tion program, the school food service program, the school counseling program, and a school site health promotion initiative for faculty and staff. All eight of these areas can be utilized as highly valuable resources to facilitate the attainment of the health objec tives for the nation. This schematic, first advanced by Kolbe, includes those diverse programs which have as their objectives the promotion of some aspect of health, either for students or staff, within the school setting. Specific suggestions for programming to attain those 1990 health objectives via an integrated school-based approach are discussed.

What Have We Learned From Collaborative Partnerships to Concomitantly Improve Both Education and Health

BACKGROUND Collaborative partnerships are an essential means to concomitantly improve both education outcomes and health outcomes among K-12 students. METHODS We describe examples of contemporaneous, interactive, and evolving partnerships that have been implemented, respectively, by a national governmental health organization, national nongovernmental education and health organizations, a state governmental education organization, and a local nongovernmental health organization that serves partner schools. RESULTS Each of these partnerships strategically built operational infrastructures that enabled partners to efficiently combine their resources to improve student education and health. CONCLUSIONS To implement a Whole School, Whole Community, Whole Child Framework, we need to purposefully strengthen, expand, and interconnect national, state, and local collaborative partnerships and supporting infrastructures that concomitantly can improve both education and health.

Addressing the Social Determinants of Health of Children and Youth A Role for SOPHE Members

The determinants of youth health disparities include poverty, unequal access to health care, poor environmental conditions, and educational inequities. Poor and minority children have more health problems and less access to health care than their higher socioeconomic status cohorts. Having more health problems leads to more absenteeism in school, which, in turn, can affect achievement. The educational level that one attains is a significant determinant of one’s earning potential and health. Those who learn more earn more money and have a better health status. Those who do not attain a high school diploma on average live 6 to 9 years less than those who do graduate from high school. Furthermore, their children also experience poorer health and the cycle is repeated. Achieving a high school diploma and a college degree is an acknowledged route out of poverty. However, that route is blocked for many poor and minority students. SOPHE is in a prime position to be the organization linking the health care, public health and education sectors in addressing the reduction of both health disparities and educational inequities. This article describes what SOPHE members can do both individually and collectively to reduce the health and educational inequities facing our most vulnerable children.

Placing Students at the Center: The Whole School, Whole Community, Whole Child Model

BACKGROUND Students are the heart of the Whole School, Whole Community, Whole Child (WSCC) model. Students are the recipients of programs and services to ensure that they are healthy, safe, engaged, supported, and challenged and also serve as partners in the implementation and dissemination of the WSCC model. METHODS A review of the number of students nationwide enjoying the 5 Whole Child tenets reveals severe deficiencies while a review of student-centered approaches, including student engagement and student voice, appears to be one way to remedy these deficiencies. RESULTS Research in both education and health reveals that giving students a voice and engaging students as partners benefits them by fostering development of skills, improvement in competence, and exertion of control over their lives while simultaneously improving outcomes for their peers and the entire school/organization. CONCLUSIONS Creating meaningful roles for students as allies, decision makers, planners, and consumers shows a commitment to prepare them for the challenges of today and the possibilities of tomorrow.

Health Services and Health Education

The leading causes of mortality and morbidity across all age groups are related to six categories of behavior that are often established during youth: unhealthy dietary choices, physical inactivity, tobacco use, alcohol and other drug use, behaviors leading to injuries or violence, and unsafe sexual behaviors. This chapter describes how a quality health services program and a quality health education course of study can improve both health and educational outcomes for students. The eight components of a quality school health approach and priority actions for coordinating health services and disciplines are reviewed. The chapter also describes the role and activities of school nurses, the most common providers of health services to students nationwide. Within the movement toward community schools or full-service schools, school-based or school-linked health centers (SBHCs) are relatively recent developments that provide accessible, low-cost medical and mental health-care services specifically designed for students and sometimes their families. By meeting students’ health and social needs, community schools produce a variety of positive educational outcomes. Finally, quality health education is important in reducing health-risk behaviors, improving academic behaviors, and improving health literacy; many evidence-based prevention programs focused on a single behavior, such as alcohol use, may be incorporated within health education. The chapter closes with lessons learned from the case of HealthMPowers, a grassroots initiative to combat childhood obesity in Georgia.