IDEAS IN ACTION

Healthy Schools - PSCI 335

Term: Fall 2007

Instructor: Mary Summers and Jackie McLaughlin

Distinguished Policymaker: Various, including School District of Philadelphia and CDC officials

Course Description: This community service and research seminar will address the question of how to implement the new federal mandates for school “wellness policies” in ways that will improve the health environment in West Philadelphia schools. The Nutrition and WIC Reauthorization Act of 2004 requires school districts to implement school wellness policies. In response to these requirements the School District of Philadelphia has called for the establishment of School Health Councils (SHC’s). This seminar will develop a pilot program to test the efficacy of using service-learning teams of undergraduates and graduate students to facilitate the development of SHCs and the Center for Disease Control’s School Health Index (SHI) school self-assessment and planning tool in two elementary schools in West Philadelphia. This process is intended to result in a realistic and meaningful school health implementation plan and an ongoing action project to put this plan into practice. Penn students will involve members of the school administration, teachers, staff, parents and community members in the SHC and SHI process with a special focus on encouraging participation from the schools’ students. If this model for the use of Penn service-learning teams is successful, it will form the basis of an ongoing partnership with the School District’s Office of Health, Safety, & Physical Education to expand such efforts to more schools.

The public officials who will be helping to convene this course are Bettyann Creighton, Director of Health, Safety, & Physical Education for the School District of Philadelphia and Glenn Devitt, Coordinator of the Steps to a Healthier Philadelphia program for the School District. Their Office has conducted more than 60 School Health Index assessment and planning projects in local schools and is very interested in the potential of college based service-learning programs to expand and deepen their capacity to use the establishment of SHC’s and the use of the SHI to improve student and staff health and well-being. Course speakers will include members of the School District’s Central Level School Health Council, whose areas of responsibility and expertise will enhance students’ understanding of the multiple institutions that shape school health environments and effective means of improving these environments. These speakers will potentially include  representatives from the School District’s Food Services, School Health Services, Physical Education, Nutrition Education, Safety Coordination and Facilities; Behavioral Services; Employee Health Services; HIV and AIDS Education; Aramark Food Services; the Mayor’s Office of Health and Fitness; the Philadelphia Department of Public Health; the American Diabetes Association; the American Cancer Society; Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia; the Youth Study Center;  The Food Trust; and the Urban Nutrition Initiative.