Ensuring That No Child Is Left Behind: How Are Student Health Risks & Resilience Related to the Academic Progress of Schools? |
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By: Thomas L. Hanson, Gregory Austin, June Lee-BayhaPublic schools are under enormous pressure to demonstrate academic gains on “high-stakes” standardized achievement tests. However, too many students come to school with developmental and health-related problems that make successful learning difficult, if not impossible. Schools seeking to improve student academic performance cannot ignore the role that health, school safety, caring relationships in the school, low rates of alcohol and other drug use, nutrition, and exercise play in their overall efforts. Based on data from the California Healthy Kids Survey, this report underscores the importance to academic achievement of key risk and youth development factors. According to this report, policies and practices that focus exclusively on raising test scores, while ignoring the comprehensive health needs of students, are likely to leave many children behind. A corresponding PowerPoint presentation includes talking points and background information to enable anyone to make a presentation on the study results. For other related publications, please see California Healthy Kids Survey Reports & Resources. |
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