The World Health Organization’s Health Promoting Schools (HPS) framework is a whole-school approach to promoting health that recognizes the intrinsic relationship between health and education. Healthy students achieve better educational outcomes which, in turn, are associated with improved health, including later in life. Over the past two years, MCRI’s Centre for Adolescent Health, a WHO Collaborating Centre, has been working on a number of distinct, yet related projects with the WHO, UNESCO and others aiming to review current policies and evidence, and to develop new global standards and implementation guidance for HPS. In this forum, the team behind this work will share their findings, reflect on this body of work, and discuss how we can improve health outcomes for all by “making every school a health promoting school”.
Speakers:
- Prof. Susan Sawyer – Geoff and Helen Handbury Chair of Adolescent Health, Department of Paediatrics, The University of Melbourne; Director, Centre for Adolescent Health, Royal Children’s Hospital; and Group Leader, Adolescent Health, Murdoch Children’s Research Institute
- Dr Ruth Aston – Research Fellow and Lecturer at the Centre for Program Evaluation, Melbourne Graduate School of Education at The University of Melbourne, Education and Evaluation specialist, MCRI Health Promoting Schools
- Dr Monika Raniti – Senior Research Officer, Centre for Adolescent Health, MCRI and Honorary Research Fellow, Department of Paediatrics, University of Melbourne
Chair:
- Dr Natalie Evans – Global Health Fellow, Murdoch Children’s Research Institute
The original forum was held on Monday 12 July, 2021 at 12.30-1.30pm