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Preface

Greatness resides in every child
and it is our task to uncover it.

- Maurice Elias

Purpose

The State of Maine Guidelines for Coordinating School Health Programs has two primary purposes. The first purpose is to focus discussion on and develop consensus concerning the role of schools in contributing to youth health and education. It is designed to be a partner document to the State of Maine Learning Results, the Maine Marks and Healthy People 2010 health objectives for the nation. The guide is based on the premise that:

All students should have the opportunity to be fit, healthy and ready to learn.
Schools and communities need to work collaboratively so they are ready to help children become healthy, productive citizens.
Healthy children make better students, and better students make healthy communities.
Students' physical, social, and emotional development needs ongoing support and assessment as does their academic development.

The second purpose of the guide is to provide general directions and assessment indicators for local schools regarding the development of coordinated and quality school health programs.

Background of Maine’s Initiative

Maine is one of twenty states to receive funding from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Division of Adolescent and School Health, to establish a statewide system for coordinating school health programs. The grant supports the creation, improvement and sustainability of a system for coordinating the school-related programs and services of Maine state agencies. This system is designed, in turn, to help support and guide local Maine communities as they promote the health and learning of all students.

Organization of the Guide

There are nine sections in State of Maine Guidelines for Coordinating School Health Programs. Section A describes the critical process for coordinating all of the activities that contribute to healthy schools and healthy students. Section B through Section I provide details about the eight components of a quality and coordinated program, as identified by the Centers for Disease Control.

The organization of the component sections is modeled after the State of Maine Learning Results (1997) which identifies essential knowledge and skills to be achieved by all Maine Students. Each component section has four parts:

Component definition and rationale
Guidelines (for quality programming)
Indicators (descriptors for measuring progress in implementing a quality component).
Resources ( State and national organizations and contact people, as well as web sites and print resources that can support implementation).

The organization of the coordination section is somewhat different from that of the component sections. It provides:

A definition, description and rationale for coordinating school health programs.
Best practices in coordinating school health programs (equivalent to the guidelines for the component areas)
Steps to coordinate a school health program. (These steps can also be used as indicators to monitor the progress of the coordination process).

The pages for each section are numbered independently to facilitate use by health professionals with primary responsibility for one or two components. It is always recommended that component area leaders use and distribute the first section on coordination with the guidelines for the individual component areas in order to improve coordination and cooperation.

A Work in Progress

Health knowledge and services are expanding and changing rapidly. In order to stay current this document will be reviewed and revised annually. Revisions will be electronically posted on the Maine school health web site at www.mainecshp.com. Your feedback is always welcome and may be sent via the web site.

Thanks again to the many people who have contributed to this document. We hope that readers will find it helpful in addressing the health and education needs of students.

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