Student health

A statewide collaborative supports schools, after-school programs, primary care practices, child care centers, work sites, and communities in promoting increased physical activity and healthy eating in Maine youth, leading to favorable behavior changes and a halt in the increase in childhood overweight/obesity.

As part of a larger statewide, collaborative initiative targeting four key settings, a pediatric health system promotes policy and practice changes in schools and school districts, leading to increased efforts to promote healthier behaviors and to improvements in physical fitness among students.

Connecticut's 78 school-based health centers offer a broad array of confidential mental health services to elementary, middle, and high school students co-located with traditional primary and acute medical services. The school-based centers have enhanced access to mental health services and generated high levels of satisfaction for students (particularly African-American and Hispanic males), and have led to less missed class time.

School-based health centers provide comprehensive reproductive and sexual health services to inner-city public school students, leading to enhanced access to contraception, prenatal care, and screening and treatment for sexually transmitted diseases.

A school district's multifaceted, collaborative initiative to reduce the impact of asthma includes multiple policies and subsequent programs such as electronic monitoring, case management, and stakeholder-specific education, leading to fewer asthma-related absences and better academic performance, behavior, health, and quality of life for students with asthma.

Trained school nurses held four weekly, one-on-one sessions with high school students who smoke; the sessions did not have a larger impact on long-term smoking rates than did four shorter, information-focused sessions, but both types of counseling generated higher long-term quit rates than typical programs targeted at teen smokers.

A portable clinic uses specially designed equipment to bring full-service dental care to elementary schools serving impoverished, immigrant, and uninsured children.

A public school system renovated the athletic track at the system's only high school and promoted it as an attractive place to exercise, leading to increased use of the track by students, individual residents, and community groups, and to anecdotal reports of weight loss and improved cardiovascular health.

A statewide collaborative initiative targeting six key sectors promotes policy and practice changes in schools, leading to the widespread adoption of strategies to promote healthy eating and physical activity, including improvements in the nutritional quality of school meals.

A community-based program sends annual report cards to parents documenting their child's body mass index and fitness, offers healthier food options in school, and provides expanded physical education opportunities before, during, and after school, leading to improved fitness levels and modest reductions in obesity among participating students.