Abstract
This article addresses the important role school health education program can play in reducing youth risky behaviors that lead to incarceration, diseases and fatalities or that impact their academic performance in school. Children growing up are at risks of exposure to different behaviors and common social influences which if unchecked result in unexpected health consequences common among youth in America today. According to US Centers for Disease Control & Prevention, the six leading behaviors that cause death, disability, and social problems among American children are: unintentional injuries and violence, alcohol and drug use, tobacco use, unhealthy diets, inadequate physical activities, and sexual behaviors and diseases. This article shows that school health program: 1) can provide the foundation for children to learn desired healthy behaviors in order to preserve life, 2) protects the future of children and that of the nation, 3) can teach students skills to recognize risky behaviors and resist them, 4) can boost community efforts to achieve desired health behaviors, 5) closes socio-economic gaps that interfere with basic nurturing of children, and 6) finally links local stakeholders as partners in promoting community safety. Through review of literature, the authors found that it costs ($588) daily or (214,620) annually to incarcerate a juvenile and only $75 daily for the cost of individualized community-based services. The cost to New York is over $900,000, yet does not address the causative issues. The authors recommend that schools teach comprehensive school health from kindergarten to grade 12 and employ health educators to support teachers teach health promotion and education.
Highlights
Every day all over the United States, over 55 million children from prekindergarten to grade 12 are in American public and private schools being educated by over 3.7 million teachers according to the National Center for Education Statistics [1] [2]
This article addresses the important role school health education program can play in reducing youth risky behaviors that lead to incarceration, diseases and fatalities or that impact their academic performance in school
This article shows that school health program: 1) can provide the foundation for children to learn desired healthy behaviors in order to preserve life, 2) protects the future of children and that of the nation, 3) can teach students skills to recognize risky behaviors and resist them, 4) can boost community efforts to achieve desired health behaviors, 5) closes socio-economic gaps that interfere with basic nurturing of children, and 6) links local stakeholders as partners in promoting community safety
Summary
Every day all over the United States, over 55 million children from prekindergarten to grade 12 are in American public and private schools being educated by over 3.7 million teachers according to the National Center for Education Statistics [1] [2] Among this population area sizeable number of school children who come from single household families with no adult to supervise them for the most time after school. The authors explored the significance of school health program in promoting children’s health, improving general education and ensuring proper physical and emotional development They further explored the effectiveness of early exposure of children to healthy habits as well as well as the motivation for the establishment of the Whole School, Whole Community, Whole Child Model [WSCC] in 2015 by the U.S Centers for Disease Prevention and Control (CDC) [8]. Schools can play a role in reducing the number of juvenile crimes and incarceration by incorporating school-based health programs to make children aware of the consequences of risky health behaviors
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