A New Paradigm for School Health Promotion
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The school-based and school-linked health promotion of the 21st century must be and will be significantly different than the traditional, issue-focused, quickly find/develop the best (including consideration of costs, risks) program of the past three decades. The need to evidence-based and experience-tested programs will not disappear, but they will need to be nurtured within a dramatically new approach that includes these dimensions that are common to all sectors/approaches working with schools:
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A. Start with the Contextualization of approaches and programs into several generalized types of country and regional contexts and truly
understanding the local situation and needs.
B. Greater, regular attention to better data, monitoring and analysis, more informed multi-sector choices and focusing of resources on priority
issues or conditions relevant to country/state program planning, including attention from donors and external partners to ensuring that project are tied
to feasible long-term programs and country/stakeholder ownership and an ongoing cooperative process to manage emerging issues.
C. Positioning these choices regarding priority issues within the needs of the whole child and ensuring that all children have equitable access and
opportunities for educational success. Specifically addressing social and economic determinants and alleviating disadvantages are part of this
consideration.
D. Choosing evidence-based and experience-tested interventions (specific policies, programs, services, practices) that are suited to the local
context and capacities and then combining several into multiple intervention programs (MIP’s) addressing broad education, health and social
issues and conditions.
E. Combining these selected multi-intervention programs into a multi-component approach (MCA) such as Health Promoting Schools and ensuring that
this adapted MCA is aligned with other MCA’s being used by other sectors, ministries &agencies that promote safe schools, child-friendly, inclusive
schools and others.
F. Building and maintaining the core components or infrastructure of all multi-component approaches, including policy, instruction/education,
services, social support from parents/community and healthy physical environment/practical resources.
G. Addressing the quality of implementation of programs and approaches and ensuring from the outset that they can be maintained, scaled up,
have planned successions and transitions, thereby increasing the likelihood that they will be sustained.
H. Building organizational and system capacity as well as professional knowledge and competencies. These capacities include defined start up and
ongoing financial and human resources as well as operational capacities such as coordinated policy/leadership, assigning inter-sectoral and
intra-sector coordinators at all levels, establishing informal and formal mechanisms for cooperation, ongoing knowledge development and exchange,
long-term workforce development strategies in several sectors, regular monitoring and reporting linked with systematic improvement, joint strategic issue
management processes and explicit planning for sustainability of programs and approaches.
I. Integration of health and social programs within the core mandates, constraints and concerns of education systems so that the mutual,
ongoing commitments of financial and human resources are explicitly negotiated and regularly reviewed, so that educational priorities such as school
attendance/participation and at-risk students are achieved as well as healthy or social priorities, that the work lives and beliefs/concerns of educators
are better understood and addressed.
J. Shifting towards an ecological approach, systems-focused actions that address the structures, processes and practices of complex, open,
adaptive and bureaucratic systems through the better use of systems science and organizational development tools and strategies.
understanding the local situation and needs.
B. Greater, regular attention to better data, monitoring and analysis, more informed multi-sector choices and focusing of resources on priority
issues or conditions relevant to country/state program planning, including attention from donors and external partners to ensuring that project are tied
to feasible long-term programs and country/stakeholder ownership and an ongoing cooperative process to manage emerging issues.
C. Positioning these choices regarding priority issues within the needs of the whole child and ensuring that all children have equitable access and
opportunities for educational success. Specifically addressing social and economic determinants and alleviating disadvantages are part of this
consideration.
D. Choosing evidence-based and experience-tested interventions (specific policies, programs, services, practices) that are suited to the local
context and capacities and then combining several into multiple intervention programs (MIP’s) addressing broad education, health and social
issues and conditions.
E. Combining these selected multi-intervention programs into a multi-component approach (MCA) such as Health Promoting Schools and ensuring that
this adapted MCA is aligned with other MCA’s being used by other sectors, ministries &agencies that promote safe schools, child-friendly, inclusive
schools and others.
F. Building and maintaining the core components or infrastructure of all multi-component approaches, including policy, instruction/education,
services, social support from parents/community and healthy physical environment/practical resources.
G. Addressing the quality of implementation of programs and approaches and ensuring from the outset that they can be maintained, scaled up,
have planned successions and transitions, thereby increasing the likelihood that they will be sustained.
H. Building organizational and system capacity as well as professional knowledge and competencies. These capacities include defined start up and
ongoing financial and human resources as well as operational capacities such as coordinated policy/leadership, assigning inter-sectoral and
intra-sector coordinators at all levels, establishing informal and formal mechanisms for cooperation, ongoing knowledge development and exchange,
long-term workforce development strategies in several sectors, regular monitoring and reporting linked with systematic improvement, joint strategic issue
management processes and explicit planning for sustainability of programs and approaches.
I. Integration of health and social programs within the core mandates, constraints and concerns of education systems so that the mutual,
ongoing commitments of financial and human resources are explicitly negotiated and regularly reviewed, so that educational priorities such as school
attendance/participation and at-risk students are achieved as well as healthy or social priorities, that the work lives and beliefs/concerns of educators
are better understood and addressed.
J. Shifting towards an ecological approach, systems-focused actions that address the structures, processes and practices of complex, open,
adaptive and bureaucratic systems through the better use of systems science and organizational development tools and strategies.