Use of a coordinated school health training model to facilitate dissemination and implementation of an elementary school obesity prevention program in Harris County, Texas

Harris County, Texas is a diverse metropolitan area with 3,886,207 residents and 781,127 school-aged children. The Steps to a Healthier Houston-Harris County Consortium was funded in 2005 to implement the Coordinated Approach To Child Health (CATCH) in all Harris County public elementary schools. This presentation describes the training model, evaluation results, and program implementation lessons learned. A one-day, interactive CATCH training model informed by Social Cognitive Theory was used to train a school team of classroom teachers, physical education specialists, child nutrition personnel, and administrators. The training outlines the need for coordinated school health (CSH) and provides trainees time to review and practice the CSH components, assemble a CSH campus committee, and develop a campus strategic plan for implementing CSH goals. A total of 39 implementation CATCH trainings and one booster training were conducted between March, 2006 - November, 2007, reaching 488 total schools and 19 school districts. Pre-and post-training surveys were administered to school teams at the beginning and end of CATCH training to assess training impact on psychosocial determinants related to CSH implementation. Preliminary pre- and post-test data from 269 school teams show school staff members reported a statistically significant increase (p <.001) in collective self-efficacy to improve their school health environment after attending a CATCH training. Challenges include arranging a complete school team to attend training and scheduling around the academic calendar. Preliminary findings suggest a social cognitive and action planning approach to training school staff can influence key behavioral constructs associated with implementation of CSH programs.