sábado, 12 de marzo de 2011

Addressing the Needs of the Whole Child | Preventing Chronic Disease: March 2011: 10_0014





Volume 8: No. 2, March 2011

SPECIAL TOPIC
Addressing the Needs of the Whole Child: What Public Health Can Do to Answer the Education Sector’s Call for a Stronger Partnership

Diane Allensworth, PhD; Theresa C. Lewallen, MEd; Beth Stevenson, MPH; Susan Katz, MPH
Suggested citation for this article: Allensworth D, Lewallen TC, Stevenson B, Katz S.
Addressing the needs of the whole child: what public health can do to answer the education sector’s call for a stronger partnership. Prev Chronic Dis 2011;8(2).
http://www.cdc.gov/pcd/issues/2011/mar/10_0014.htm. Accessed [date].



PEER REVIEWED

Abstract
Although the overall level of child health in the United States remains high, public health professionals know that racial and ethnic disparities in child and adolescent health persist and that lifestyle choices related to chronic disease in adults are often established in childhood and adolescence. And yet, those health needs are not the public health sector’s alone to resolve. We have natural partners among educators. Improving graduation rates is one of the most cost-effective ways to reduce health disparities. This article provides strategies for how public health professionals can answer this call by educators to address the needs of the whole child.

Background

Education and health are interdependent systems that increasingly need to collaborate in helping our nation’s children. The authors of The Learning Compact Redefined: A Call to Action recommend that local schools work closely with the public health community to adequately address the conditions that affect learning (1). This call represents both a challenge and an opportunity for the public health community. Not only do public health data indicate that education levels and health outcomes are highly correlated but public health professionals also have pressing needs to reach students to achieve health outcomes.

Health and education are integrally linked (2). Children who do not complete high school are likely to become adults who have employment problems, lower health literacy, higher rates of illness, and earlier deaths than those who graduate from high school (3,4). Evidence suggests that improving high school graduation rates may be more cost-effective than most medical interventions in reducing health disparities (3,5). Graduation from high school is associated with an increase in average lifespan of 6 to 9 years (6). The reasons students drop out of school are complex (7), and health can be integrally related to many of these reasons, including barriers to learning such as hunger and poor nutrition and even fear for safety at school (8). Health problems contribute to absenteeism and, in turn, absenteeism (9) as well as unintended pregnancy and delinquency (5) are associated with dropping out of school. Other risk factors for dropping out are frequent changes of schools, lack of parent participation in schooling, and nonproductive use of leisure time, such as watching many hours of television daily (8).

The United States ranks 18th among nations in high school completion rates (10). Every school day, 7,000 students drop out of school, resulting in 1.2 million dropouts annually (3). Although generally the percentage of students in the United States who complete school is close to 70%, the rates for poor Native American, African American, and Hispanic students are substantially lower. In some urban areas the number of Hispanic and African American male students who graduate is less than 50% (9).

Dropping out of school contributes to future unemployment or underemployment, and dropouts are more likely to commit crime or rely on government assistance for health care, housing, and food. Dropouts are less likely to raise healthy, well-educated children (3). A combination of underlying health, family, community, and education issues must be addressed to prevent this cycle. No one sector can address the complexity of the interdependent needs of children. Previous studies have found that when the public health and education sectors work together and collaborate with community agencies, students’ academic achievement and health improve (11-14).

full-text:
Preventing Chronic Disease: March 2011: 10_0014

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