Knowledge Matters May 2010This is a featured page

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Canada's monthly school health report from the Canadian Association for School Health
Volume 4 Issue 9 (May 2010)
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Featuring Annual Report on the Canadian School Health Knowledge Network & Community

This month’s feature article is our annual update/report on the activities of the Canadian School Health Knowledge Network for 2009-10. If you have been receiving our monthly SH Report, Knowledge Matters, or, if you have been visiting our monthly blog page on www.canadianschoolhealth.ca, you will have seen these items before but we hope that this is an opportunity to reflect on the progress we are making in school health in Canada.

Canadian School Health Knowledge Network NewsCanadian Media Reports for May 2010

  • Schools for All. A National Conference on Alleviating Disadvantage. April 21-23, Halifax, NS
    The registration fee included access to five webinars to be held jointly with an international SH Symposium in Geneva in July. As well, the discussion paper on how schools can address determinants, reduce disparities and alleviate disadvantages was discussed at the Canadian conference and is now forwarded to the international symposium for finalization.

  • National Consultation on School Mental Health. CASH is looking for your feedback to guide our input into several national initiatives relating to schools and mental health. These include a national consortium project, consultation with the Canadian Population Health Initiative, the Mental Health Commission of Canada and a series of webinars on implementation strategies. Please see below for a draft statement of principles and important points to improve SMH programs in Canada.

  • How Tweet! Do you have SH news you want to share with 2500 other Canadian SH practitioners. Then feel free to post your news on the shared "CSH Tweets" account on Twitter. Simply go to www.twitter.com/cshtweets, sign in as user "cshtweets`, password `cash-aces and post your news. Those tweets and other items posted on this web site through posting updates directly onto our School Health Blog will be included in this mailout to 2500 people. This process is starting to work, with three recent postings coming directly from other organizations into the School Health Blog.

  • CSH Community Grows
    The CSH Knowledge Network list of SH contacts has grown to over 2500 people. We are continuing to transfer the email contacts lists over to the professional networking web site at www.canadianschoolhealth.ca. Agencies, organizations and individuals will be able to control the email they receive from this wiki-based web site through their own profiles. (This occurs by "watching" or "unwatching" selected pages). As well, they will be able to use the tools on the web site to interact with others and receive RSS feeds from the daily blog of SH news.

  • Call for Suggestions about Canadian SH Research
    Marthe Deschenes (Public Health Institute of Quebec) and Doug McCall have been asked to prepare a book chapter on Canadian developments in SH promotion. See their call for suggestions on this page and then send your suggestions to dmccall@cash-aces.ca

  • CASH Invited to CIHR Injury Prevention Project
    The Association will be represented on the Steering Committee of a multi-year CIHR project on injury prevention being led by the Children’s Hospital of BC. This is the first major project on injury prevention in Canada in a long time and we look forward to building a comprehensive, school-based and school-linked approach to this problem using this project as a starting point.


News Story (May 31-10) Let 'em be kids A new report suggests a balance of unstructured and structured play http://is.gd/cBnrD

News Story (May 31-10) RBC Nurses for Kids program aims to raise healthier kids in Saskatchewan: http://is.gd/cy5odhttp://is.gd/cy5od

News Story (May 31-10) School role as community hub threatened by new zoning, trustees argue http://is.gd/cxiOL

News Story (May 31-10) Smoking rates decline among Canadian young adults; stable among teens http://is.gd/cxiVp

News Story (May 31-10) Ottawa ready to spend $1 billion on maternal health, sources say http://is.gd/cxj9F

News Story (May 28-10) Risk of heart attacks higher for poor Canadian neighbourhoods http://is.gd/cAbnG

News Story (May 26-10) Canada’s teen birth and abortion rate drops by 36.9 per cent http://is.gd/cxjhm

News Story (May 24-10) Community Schools Tap into Wealth of Resources in New Brunswick http://is.gd/cLKGR

News Story (May 23-10) Federal government to fund world’s largest medical libraryRead more: http://is.gd/cRypwhttp://is.gd/cRypw

News Story (May 20-10) Hamilton-Wentworth trustees give healthy start to board nutrition policy http://is.gd/cBnvT

News Release (May 19-10) Quebec earnings gap at 30-year high http://is.gd/cA8eM

News Story (May 17-10) Social stigma major challenge with AIDS, says researcher who isolated virus http://is.gd/cdTxv

News Story (May 17-10) Pesticide link to ADHD in children: Study http://is.gd/cdSYq

Editorial Globe & Mail (May 16-10) Silence is no answer for Planned Parenthood funding http://is.gd/cd9jj

News Story (May 16-10) Walkerton marks 10th anniversary of tragedy http://is.gd/cd9o8

News Story (May 22-10) Canada’s reputation for low infant mortality takes stunning decline http://is.gd/cA85T

News Story (May 14-10) Yoga in schools helps kids relax, concentrate http://is.gd/cdTmX

News Story (May 14-10) Study shows consistent benefit of early daycare http://is.gd/cdagt

News Story (May 13-10) ‘Draconian’ law will weaken B.C. children’s watchdog: critics http://is.gd/cdbnk

News Release (May 12-10) Ontario Healthy School Recognition Program Grows This year, 808 schools have already pledged to do more than 1794 healthy activities as a part of the Healthy Schools Recognition Program. Those numbers continue to grow as more schools are encouraged to participate.

News Story (May 12-10) New Canadian physical activity guidelines proposed http://is.gd/c7s2D

News Story (May 6-10) Toronto Considering Community Schools http://is.gd/cLCeM

News Story (May 6-10) Toronto eyeing 'community schools http://is.gd/cLCeM

News Story (May 5-10) Toronto Education Director Supports Full Service Schools http://is.gd/cLBOR

News Story (May 3-10) TV viewing delays development for babies: Study http://is.gd/cdaoB
Canadian Research, Reports and Resources from the May School Health Blog Postings

Our blog also tracks Canadian research studies, reports and new planning/educational resources announcements. Here are the ones posted for May 2010:

 · Process description and evaluation of Canadian Physical Activity Guidelines development
· Advancing the future of physical activity guidelines in Canada: an independent expert panel interpretation of the evidence
· A systematic review of the evidence for Canada's Physical Activity Guidelines for Adults
  • Report. Canadian Students rank Third in Environment Literacy (CCL, 2010, p. 19) http://is.gd/bVRl5

  • Research report Promising Practices and Programs in Aboriginal Learning (Canadian Council on Learning, 2010) http://is.gd/bVPHm


Feature Article: Annual Report from the Canadian School Health Knowledge Network
Prepared by Doug McCall, Executive Director, Canadian Association for School Health

The 2009-10 school year was a return to reality in regards to the base funding of our activities. The Health & Learning Knowledge Centre of the Canadian Council on Learning had been supporting several CASH activities but the funding for both of those organizations was cancelled by the federal government. So, once again, our somewhat amusing phrase, “CASH has no cash” is true. However, the follow up sentence we always use with that phrase also continues to be true. Sometimes, small is not only beautiful, but also stronger in the long run. CASH is based on the voluntary cooperation of many, many people, including its contract staff, so it does not disappear when project funds are scarce. Indeed, this strength, which is true at the local level in most agencies, at the provincial/territorial level through the many school health coalitions and at the national level, where CASH works with many national NGO’s, several federal/national departments and agencies and on several projects, has enabled the SH movement to survive when many similar organizations have disappeared due to their dependence on external funds.

Indeed, the Canadian school health movement has never been stronger, with these positive trends:

  • several university-based research programs are now operating and many of them are making the transition towards a more comprehensive, ecological, systems-based understanding of SH promotion
  • several major national school-related projects are underway on aboriginal schools, disadvantaged schools, mental health, substance abuse, nutrition and other issues as well as over 20 national program-focused projects
  • great linkages have been established with international SH organizations/discussions,
  • inter-governmental consortia/networks on healthy schools, community schools and safe schools are now operating
  • a significant and successful shift is underway to use new technologies to save time and money as well as make participation less dependent on travel funds and long distance telephone charges.
  • there are active provincial/territorial SH, CS and/or SS coalitions in all jurisdictions
  • the Canadian educational organizations representing teachers, school principals and school district administrators are all taking an active interest in health issues through their national conferences, magazines and other activities
  • the annual SH conference, wiki-based web site, communities of practice, webinars, email list, SH reports. NGO network, researchers network and other activities facilitated by CASH are all fragile but surviving through small grants and specific activities
The 2009-10 year included these highlights:

  • The final issue of the CASH-CTF Magazine Health & Learning was distributed to all schools in Canada ending a three year project funded by the Health & Learning Knowledge Centre of the Canadian Council on Learning. Nine issues were published during this program. We have placed the back issues on the CSH web site. The plan for 2010-11 is to change that print-based publication to a web format and deliver it through email alerts directly to teachers. The plan includes cooperation with American and Australian SH organizations in making the publication into a thematic, multi-media product that includes peer-reviewed articles, practice stories and resource collections. We are also pleased to note that CTF is intending to have regular health articles as part of its own electronic magazine.
  • A similar joint venture with the Canadian Public Health Association ended as well, due to the expiry of the CCL funding. This three year program ensured that school health matters were included in the CPHA journal through four page inserts in each issue.
  • This year also saw the CASH framework for Indigenous School Health published and then presented in several conferences, including the American School Health Association conference in Denver Colorado and in Geneva Switzerland. Several aboriginal nations were included in the development including the Seminole, Navajo, Hawaii, Maori, Torres Straits, Inuit, Metis and First Nations. The framework describes a more culturally relevant way to approach SH promotion on schools serving aboriginal communities. Shirley Tagalik has been our leader on this and the National Collaborating Centre on Aboriginal health was our partner.
  • The Indigenous School Health framework was used in conjunction with a manual on Empowering Aboriginal Youth published by the CAMH Centre on Prevention Science at the University of Western Ontario in a series of five popular webinars which included excellent presentations, online discussions and selected resources and readings. Over 175 people registered for those sessions. Many thanks to Dawn Benson and Claire Crooks for their leadership and hard work on this.
  • Two other communities of practice in our network also used webinars and other web 2.0 technologies to support their work. The CoP on substance abuse prevention , chaired by Colin Mangham in 2009-10, held a series on webinars and web meeting discussions on implementing prevention programs. Presentations were made from several successful national programs and we began to accumulate knowledge about implementation and diffusion of programs in real world conditions rather than controlled trials. See the three discussion papers on this topic in the SAP CoP section of the CSH web site. The substance abuse prevention CoP members and others in the SH Knowledge Network also used wiki-based tools to comment on the draft School Standards being prepared by the Canadian Centre on Substance Abuse. Over 100 people commented on the draft paper that was posted in a wiki format (See the draft and read the comments here. Read the subsequent CASH letter to CCSA here) The CASH and other input persuaded the CCSA to consult more broadly before publishing their standards. The work of the CoP members and CASH project staff continued throughout the year with additions to the extensive listing of research, resources and evaluated and promising programs in the SAP Schools Toolbox. This toolbox will be transferred to the World School Health Encyclopedia & Knowledge Exchange program next year, where these references and resources will be combined with webinars and online discussions. See the call for presenters, writers and reviewers in the international web site.
  • New technology has also been used in the School Mental Health (SMH) Community of Practice to consult members about their knowledge needs and preferences. A discussion in the May 2009 CoP workshop in Gatineau, Quebec was followed up with online polling. Over 130 people responded to both polls and their feedback is summarized in a report that can be found here. As well, 2009-10, members of the Canadian School Mental Health Community of Practice developed a toolbox of research, reports and resources for promoting mental health through school-based and school-linked approaches, programs and strategies. The toolbox used a comprehensive framework or outline has been used to list research, reports and resources to address health, social and other issues in a comprehensive, coordinated and whole school manner. This extensive list (over 300) of research references, planning and educational tools, systematic reviews, evaluated programs and promising Canadian programs has been transferred to an international web site, where they will continue to grow as an evergreen resource for those working on SMH issues. Go to the World School Health Encyclopedia and Knowledge Exchange Program for the latest, updated version of the SMH Toolbox. Our appreciation is extended to Gloria Wells and Michele Forge for their co-chairing the SMH CoP in 2009-10. On a final note, CASH is working with several national mental health, public health and education organizations to develop a Canadian Consensus Statement on School Mental Health Promotion. The draft is still open for comment, so go take a look and leave your suggestions using the wiki-based tools for editing or posting comments.
  • Many of the members of our Mental Health and Substance Abuse Prevention CoP’s participated in two web meetingsImplementation, Capacity and Sustainability Issues. that developed an agenda of implementation, capacity and coordination issues relevant to school health promotion. Recognizing that such issues are world wide in their nature, this dialogue will be continued in an international discussion group that will be led by the International School Health Network. See the initial set of papers, see and hear the recorded webinars and edit/comment on the draft summaries in the ISHN call for presenters, writers, contributors and reviewers on
  • The Nutrition & Schools Community of Practice, led by Mary McKenna, persuaded the Office of Nutrition Policy of Health Canada to organize a consultation on school nutrition programs in March of 2010. Additions to the extensive list of research, reports and resources in the School Nutrition Toolbox were made throughout the year. As well, the three web summaries (on SN policies, multi-intervention programs and school activities that were funded by the PHAC Best Practices Portal) that included embedded webinar recordings and a great video on school nutrition policy prepared by a UNB student, were edited and transferred to the ISHN World School Health Encyclopedia and Knowledge Exchange program.
  • The work of the Community of Practice on Sun Safety and Environmental Health was published in the form of its own Toolbox of Research & Resources on Sun Safety in the fall of 2009. This CoP will be re-organized next year to address the linkages between sustainable development and health promotion. We hope to form partnerships with the “green schools” movement in Canada and world-wide. The linkages between these two major concerns will be discussed at the international school health symposium being held in Geneva in July 2010.
  • The final word about Communities of Practice belongs to our CoP on Disadvantaged Communities. Led by Delphine Melchert and Dwayne Provo, this partnership between CASH and the Canadian Association for Community Education developed a consensus statement, organized our national conference in Dartmouth and stimulated practical discussions about the way schools can help to address determinants, reduce disparities and alleviate disadvantages. An agenda of issues and programs relevant to communities with fewer resources and greater challenges has been developed and adopted by delegates attending an international symposium in Geneva in July, 2010.
  • Our shift to using web 2.0 technologies continues. We are asking our Canadian SH Community to join us in the wiki-based web site www.canadianschoolhealth.ca where they can communicate easily and efficiently with others in a variety of ways. Thus far, we have almost 500 members who have joined the web site and we will be inviting the rest of our network to do so by the end of this school year. By creating an account with the social networking platform wetpaint.com (no cost, no spam) members can then join the CSH web site, add their profile and use the tools to “watch” selected pages such as our monthly newsletter, join CoPs by becoming “friends” with the various CoP moderators, choose to receive email messages in their regular email box or leave them within the wiki and post comments or edits within the pages. The wiki-based web site is integrated with our Twitter newsfeed that tracks SH news and research. CSH members can receive an alert when our monthly newsletter is published, do the same for our weekly blog or even join Twitter and then “follow” www.twitter.com/cshtweets. You can learn more about how to do all this by watching our instructional videos about how to edit, add and move pages as well as make comments within this wiki in our video/web tour. (Or, read these detailed instructions on using the "Easy Edit" tools to change the text on pages, or how to create, move or work with pages.) Also see our video/web tour on joining and creating a profile. (Or, read these detailed instructions on how to manage your wetpaint account or profile). Go ahead, join us and start using the tools of the first decade of the 21st century.
  • The critical aspect of any new technology is how it serves a designated group of people or audience by providing relevant content. In the 2010-11 school year, we will be asking CSH network members to give us feedback on these uses of technology:
    • Enabling our partner NGO’s and others to use our Twitter account, www.twitter.com/cshtweets (username: cshtweets, password: cash-aces) to post brief announcements to the 2500 people in the network using a standard format/protocol with web links. These announcements are automatically fed into our monthly newsletter reaching over 2500 people and organizations.
    • Using a Twitter-based newsfeed to follow selected SH issues. For example, we will use a designated Twitter account to add items to a web page in the Mental Health CoP section on the latest research and resources.
    • Using our Google customized search engine for Canadian newspapers to find Canadian news stories on topics of interest to you.
    • Asking the chairs of our Communities of Practice to use the “friends” list linked to their respective CoP Moderator accounts to communicate with CoP members so that CASH eventually does not have to maintain those email address lists
    • Building on our success with webinars (formal presentations that can be recorded) to less formal “web meetings” where participants discuss specific topics using headsets/microphones to eliminate conference call costs and focusing on very specific problems or strategies.
    • “Drop-in” web meetings and live instant messaging at designated “office hours”. These informal sessions will have CASH staff and/or invited resource people available on line and on the telephone to respond to questions from visitors to this designated Office Hours web page in the CSH web site.

However, despite the progress we are all making towards more effective school health promotion programs in Canada, there are some warning signs that are worthy of note. These include:

  • the difficult financial times being experienced in the economy inevitably show up in government budgets. School health and other human development programs are not yet considered to be part of the core mandates of health, education or any other system, so they are vulnerable
    .
  • while there are some encouraging exceptions, our collective attention is still focused on the emerging health issues of the day and they are still competing for public, professional and political attention.

  • we know that capacity building, coordination, implementation, sustainability and systems change need to be at the heart of our efforts in the next few years but these are the issues that government officials, researchers, policy-makers and SH advocates shy away from as they still pursue project funds and "innovative", one time demonstration projects in order to be pragmatic and practical.
As we move into the second decade of the 21st century, let's try to shift the focus and move on those more basic issues.



dmccall
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