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"You cannot educate a child who is not healthy, and you cannot keep a child healthy who is not educated."
- Dr. Jocelyn Elders
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WHAT IS SCHOOL HEALTH?
The Council on School Health (COSH) defines school health as an integration of wellness, safety, growth, learning, and development in the lives of school-aged children and adolescents within the context of their school, and with the coordinated alliance of the family and the medical home.
LETTER FROM THE CHAIR
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To everyone invested in school health and in children and adolescents, welcome to the AAP Council on School Health (COSH) web site. The COSH works to establish standards of best practice for school health for children and adolescents beginning in pre-kindergarten and continuing through twelfth grade. This includes supporting a school physician in every district and a school nurse in every school.
We encourage you to look over the many resources available to you on this web site, and, if you are not a member of COSH already, to consider joining us in our efforts to improve school health across America, through education, advocacy, and support. |
Willie Sutton famously said he robbed banks because that is where the money is. Similarly, schools are where the children are. In fact, the school is a place where children are cared for and spend a good portion of their formative years. It is a place where educators ideally work in partnership with the child's family and medical home to enhance a child's or adolescent’s individual strengths. It is a place where school staff attempts to remove obstacles that might impede a child’s or adolescent’s ability to thrive both academically within the school setting and socially outside of school while they learn skills for achieving lifelong success and productivity within society. School health, then, touches most pediatricians somewhere along the life and education of a child or adolescent, and is a component of the medical home model. The more the community of pediatricians learns about and works with schools, the better care the child will get in the school setting. School health professionals and programs are key partners of the medical home and can help the pediatric practice accomplish its goals for the child and reinforce essential messages to parents in between visits.
School health takes many forms for physicians, from consulting or advisement, to on-site public health assistance, to nursing collaboration, and in some instances, to school based health centers for children and adolescents who otherwise do not have t access to a medical home. By joining the COSH, AAP members can be an active voice in implementing important improvements to school health, essential for children within the school setting, as well as the pediatricians who cares for them. If you are not a pediatrician, but work in some capacity for the physical or mental health and safety of children and adolescents in schools, we encourage you to consider becoming an affiliate member, so you can benefit from the work we do as well.
COSH is about children first. Preparing children today for tomorrow is key to every aspect of human progress in a civilized society. Children make a difference in our lives daily with their laughter, their love, and even their challenges. Please help COSH make a significant difference in the lives of children as a way of thanking them for being themselves and for enriching our lives. The COSH believes that together, we can improve the world of and for our children.
With Warm Regards,
Cynthia DiLaura Devore, MD, MA, MS, FAAP
Chair, COSH
MISSION, VISION & COSH PRINCIPLES
Mission
The Council on School Health is dedicated to maximizing the personal health, academic achievement and life-long success of children and adolescents. The COSH seeks to promote sound school health policies and practices that ensure the health and safety of school-aged children and adolescents through policy, education and advocacy.
Vision
The vision of the Council on School Health is for all children and adolescents to reach their maximum academic potential in a safe and healthy school environment that is supported by coordinated school health programs and other school-based health care services. Pediatricians and the medical home team and family will work in concert with schools to promote the physical, mental and social well-being of all children and adolescents.
COSH Principles
- COSH affirms that excellence in school health has a school physician in every school district and a school nurse in every school at ratios endorsed by the National Association of School Nurses.
- COSH supports the concept of the eight components of the Coordinated School Health Model promoted by the Centers for Disease Control as an essential foundation of a sound school health services program. (link)
- COSH endorses the importance of prevention through early recognition, prompt intervention, and early education and/or remediation of potential problems that will interfere with life-long health or learning.
- COSH acknowledges the necessity of ensuring full access of all school services in the least restrictive fashion for all children including those with special health care needs.
- COSH promotes the use of School Based Health Centers to improve access to health care, either as an adjunct to the private medical home or as a primary medical home for those families that would lack such care in any other fashion, as promulgated by the National Assembly of School Based Health Centers.
- COSH maintains that schools exercise a powerful role in shaping the health and well-being of young people and can provide a critical facility in which many agencies might work together to maintain their well-being including serving as an important public health intervention site, consistent with the American School Health Association.
IN THE NEWS
School Nurse-Pediatrician Partnership (SNAPP) Mini-Grant Program
The Council on School Health (COSH) is currently accepting applications for the School Nurse-Pediatrician Partnership (SNAPP) Mini-Grant Program. The Program will award up $1,500 to active COSH members to develop a pilot project or to expand an existing project that supports partnerships and fosters communication between them and a school nurse in their community. Projects should promote creative, collaborative community-based approaches to improve the health and academic success of students within the participating school district.
Approximately 4 mini-grants will be awarded to support projects that will be implemented during the 2013-2014 school year.
Please read the call for applications for more information including eligibility and selection criteria and allowable expenses.
Applications must be submitted via the online application by 11:59PM on June 28, 2013.
You can use this for both the home page and the Magnet Mail piece that should go out to the membership.
