Healthy People 2020's School Health Objectives

Every 10 years since 1979, the US Department of Health and Human Services has developed and published a set of Objectives to guide the nation's public health work. APHA has been a national partner in this work for over 15 years and was represented on various task groups that drafted objectives. HP 2020 has added sections devoted to Adolescent Health and Early and Middle Childhood Health to its Education and Community-based section. Several objectives in each of these sections are specific to what schools can do. There are, however, objectives scattered throughout other sections that have implications for school health practitioners. There are also objectives specific to educational outcomes including high school completion, similar to one in HP 2010, and educational readiness and progress. This presentation will include a brief history of the Healthy People initiative, a fairly short description of the process used this time to generate and review objectives, and an overview of the objectives themselves. Since HP 2020 is entirely online, screen shots of the website will help participants navigate the site on their own. As a final activity, participants will divide into job alike groups, receive copies of the school health relevant objectives and brainstorm possible ways they could contribute to achieving one or more objectives. If accepted as a poster, the poster would include the HP overview and handouts of the relevant HP 2020 objectives would be available.