Student Services/Prevention and Wellness Programs

Coordinated School Health Program

Healthy kids make better students and that better students make healthy communities! This belief is the cornerstone to DPI's Coordinated School Health Program (CSHP) and the reason why organizations and agencies representing public health, higher education, school districts, parents, and other groups have joined DPI in supporting CSHP initiatives. These initiatives address the critical health types of adolescent health behavior that research shows contribute to the leading causes of death and disability among adults and youth, such as alcohol and drug use, tobacco use, lack of physical activity, violence, and risky sexual behavior. The Department of Public Instruction incorporates a variety of strategies to address these critical health behaviors and they include funding opportunities; technical assistance; free resources through printed publications, internet, and media resources; and professional development events. You can learn more about these resources and opportunities on this page and by visiting program area websites, http://dpi.wi.gov/sspw/tm-sspwprog.html.

Effective School Health Programs
Teachers, administrators, and parents want to see all students succeed and become knowledgeable, responsible, caring and healthy adults. The challenge is organizing our educational system to provide the opportunities linked with these outcomes. While there is still much debate about the value and effectiveness of various programs, more and more information that provides answers on how the learning environment in schools needs to be structured is becoming available.

Below you will learn about effective models that provide a clear, practical, systemic approach to developing policies, procedures, and activities to improve student health and academic outcomes. The goal of these models is to promote the health and well-being of students so that physical, emotional, and social problems do not interfere with their ability to become healthy, caring, responsible, and productive citizens.

Wisconsin Coordinated School Health Program Framework
The Wisconsin CSHP Framework is composed of six components that are used to organize and implement an effective school health program. These components are composed of 1) healthy school environment; 2) curriculum, instruction, and assessment; 3) student programs; 4) adult programs; 5) pupil services; and 6) family and community connections. These six components form a multi-strategy approach which seeks to address the entire range of youth risk behaviors and promote the health, well-being and positive development of students and other members of the school-community as an integral part of the school's overall mission. A Coordinated School Health Program shouldn't be seen as the responsibility of one person or one committee in a school or district, but represents a collection of school efforts to address various youth risk behaviors and to promote health.

However, schools by themselves cannot, and should not be expected to, address the nation's most serious health and social problems. Families, public health, health care workers, the media, religious organizations, community organizations that serve youth, and young people themselves also must be systematically involved. Schools can provide a critical facility in which many agencies might work together to maintain the well-being of young people.

CDC's Coordinated School Health Program model was the basis for Wisconsin's CSHP framework but it is composed of slightly different components. CDC's CSHP model consists of eight interactive components. These components consists of health education, physical education, health services, nutrition services, pupil services, healthy school environment, staff wellness, and family/community involvement. CDC and partners have developed multiple technical assistance resources to assess, development, and implement a school health program. To learn more about this model and technical assistance tools go to http://www.cdc.gov/HealthyYouth/.

CSHP Program Support Opportunities
Online Resources to Support School Health Programs
School Health Related Data
Wisconsin CSHP Resources

For more information regarding the DPI's Comprehensive School Health Program or any of its initiatives, Contact: Brian Weaver, (608) 266-7921, brian.weaver@dpi.wi.gov.

For questions about this information, contact Brian J. Weaver (608) 266-7921

Last updated on 2/22/2008 8:00:21 AM