Arkansas

Arkansas is seeking to increase the percentage of schools in which the lead health education teacher received professional development during the past 2 years on all of the following:

• Describing how widespread HIV and other STD infections are and the consequences of these infections.
• Understanding the modes of transmission and effective prevention strategies for HIV and other STDs.
• Identifying populations of youth who are at high risk of being infected with HIV and other STDs.
• Implementing health education strategies using prevention messages that are likely to be effective in reaching youth.

Activities

• Work with Juvenile Detention Centers to increase their capacity for delivering effective and sustainable HIV, STD, and teen pregnancy prevention education.
• Support state and local health department personnel in building relationships with local school districts.
• Support community members and local agencies to increase their capacity for delivering effective and sustainable HIV, STD, and teen pregnancy prevention programming at the local level.
• Work with East Lab students to increase their capacity to develop effective HIV, STD, and teen pregnancy prevention messages for adolescents through technology and social marketing.

Arkansas is seeking to increase the percentage of schools in which the lead health education teacher received professional development on at least six of the following during the past 2 years:

• Teaching HIV prevention to students with physical, medical, or cognitive disabilities.
• Teaching HIV prevention to students of various cultural backgrounds.
• Using interactive teaching methods for HIV prevention education, such as role plays or cooperative group activities.
• Teaching essential skills for health behavior change related to HIV prevention and guiding student practice of these skills.
• Teaching about health-promoting social norms and beliefs related to HIV prevention.
• Strategies for involving parents, families, and others in student learning of HIV prevention education.
• Assessing students’ performance in HIV prevention education.
• Implementing standards-based HIV prevention education curricula and student assessment.
• Using technology to improve HIV prevention education instruction.
• Teaching HIV prevention to students with limited English proficiency.
• Addressing community concerns and challenges related to HIV prevention education.

Activities

• Provide regional professional development opportunities in standards-based health education strategies.
• Provide classroom teachers with skills on how to integrate literacy and health education into elementary classrooms.
• Provide ongoing technical assistance and follow-up support for all professional development participants.

Arkansas is seeking to increase the percentage of schools that have a policy or policies that address all of the following issues:

• Attendance of students with HIV infection.
• Procedures to protect HIV-infected students and staff from discrimination.
• Maintaining confidentiality of HIV-infected students and staff.

Activities

• Offer school districts technical support in reviewing current HIV, STD, and teen pregnancy prevention policies, and provide training to district staff on strengthening policy language to support all students, faculty, and staff.
• Work closely with the health department in building relationships with local schools and community members to support better HIV prevention policies.
• Provide ongoing technical assistance and follow-up support for all districts working on policy improvement efforts.

Physical Activity

Arkansas is seeking to increase the percentage of schools in which those who teach physical education are provided with all of the following:

• Goals, objectives, and expected outcomes for physical education.
• A written physical education curriculum.
• A chart describing the annual scope and sequence of instruction for physical education.
• Plans for how to assess student performance in physical education.

Activities

• Work with national and state organizations to enhance the quality of physical education in schools by providing a research-based physical education curriculum.
• Implement student performance assessment tools in physical education classes.
• Integrate physical activity and health education throughout the school day.
• Provide ongoing technical assistance and follow-up for school districts that have identified physical activity, nutrition, and tobacco activities.

Nutrition

Arkansas is seeking to increase the percentage of schools in which the lead health education teacher received professional development on nutrition education and dietary behavior during the past 2 years.

Activities

• Implement a research-based curriculum and Health.Teacher.com Web site to enhance the quality of health education taught in schools through a collaborative effort with Arkansas Children’s Hospital.
• Attend Planet Health trainings to improve nutrition education for grades 6–8.
• Provide fresh fruits and vegetables to students in collaboration with the Arkansas Department of Education Child Nutrition office.

Tobacco

Arkansas is seeking to increase the percentage of schools that coordinate their tobacco prevention messages and programs with community and mass-media tobacco prevention efforts in the following ways:

• Gathering and sharing information about mass-media messages or community-based tobacco prevention efforts with students and families.
• Working with local agencies and organizations to plan and implement events or programs intended to reduce tobacco use.

Activities

• Work with the Arkansas Department of Health Youth Tobacco Program in planning and implementing youth programs and events aimed to reduce tobacco use.
• Implement a research-based curriculum and Health.Teacher.com Web site to enhance the quality of health education taught in schools through a collaborative effort with Arkansas Children’s Hospital.
• Provide tobacco prevention and cessation information to identified coordinated school health schools and communities to reduce tobacco use.

Arkansas is seeking to increase the percentage of schools that have a group (e.g., school health team) that helps plan and implement school health programs, with representation from 10 or more of the following:

• School administrators.
• Health education teachers.
• Physical education teachers.
• Mental health or social services staff.
• Nutrition or food service staff.
• Health services staff (e.g., school nurse).
• Maintenance and transportation staff.
• Student body.
• Parents or families of students.
• Community.
• Local health departments, agencies, or organizations.
• Faith-based organizations.
• Businesses.
• Local government.

Activities

• Strengthen the membership of the state-level coordinated school health team and recruit state team members to help secure funds for program implementation.
• Share coordinated school health data with state and local stakeholders.
• Build and maintain a strong partnership among local-level wellness committees and stakeholders to support increasing the capacity for coordinated school health.
• Provide wellness committee members professional development on the Arkansas Wellness Center toolkit to help establish wellness centers in schools.

Arkansas is seeking to increase the percentage of schools that have ever assessed their policies, activities, and programs by using the School Health Index or a similar self-assessment tool in any of the following areas:  

• Physical activity.
• Nutrition.
• Tobacco-use prevention.

Activities

• Use the School Health Index to assess programs and policies in schools and align school improvement plans with coordinated school health initiatives.
• Increase the number of school improvement plans that identify coordinated school health practices.
• Train school building staff on using the School Health Index and develop an action plan to address physical activity, nutrition, HIV, STD, and/or teen pregnancy prevention policy or program activities based on School Health Index results.
• Collect, review, and provide feedback on School Health Index action plans from identified school districts.

Arkansas is seeking to increase the percentage of schools that provide parents and families health information to increase parent and family knowledge of any of the following health issues:

• Tobacco-use prevention.
• Physical activity.
• Nutrition and healthy eating.

Activities

• Supply Wellness Center recipients with health literacy resources for parents.
• Provide training for coordinated school health districts on increasing parental involvement.
• Require parent participation in school wellness committees.
• Participate in professional development to provide parents information on developing health policies.