The school setting touches every part of a student's day and profoundly influences their current and future health and well-being. The quality and quantity of a student’s education impacts everything from their future job opportunities to their income and life chances. When schools promote healthy environments, they're setting students up for healthier, more successful lives.
Despite the clear importance of school health, the scientific output documenting effective strategies to improve inter-related health and educational outcomes and disparities has been limited, especially in nursing research. There are significant research opportunities and gaps in the field of school health that need to be addressed.
Nursing’s perspective is critical to solving the myriad complex issues in school settings, and nurses themselves are ideally situated, both within the school and in the broader community, to lead and inform this work. NINR can play a pivotal role in supporting research in school health guided by our mission and research lenses.
That’s why I’m declaring our resolute commitment to making a difference in school health and announcing it as our second strategic imperative.
NINR’s strategic imperatives serve a crucial purpose as part of our strategic plan by enabling the institute to respond swiftly and effectively to emerging issues, opportunities, or crises that are aligned with NINR’s mission and have the potential to significantly impact the health and well-being of the nation. Imperatives are not just new areas of inquiry, but also established areas that are evolving in new and interesting ways.
School health is especially well aligned with NINR’s focus on health disparities and social determinants of health. Schools encompass a critical context in which children learn, play, and grow that are, in turn, shaped by intersecting educational and health policies. Nursing research focused on social determinants of health can address critical barriers to health and learning, with parallel goals of improving school quality and increasing educational attainment.
School health has long been a priority for nursing. In the early 20th century, nursing pioneer Lillian Wald helped place nurses in schools, leading to a nursing service being established at a local public school in New York City, which eventually became a citywide public school nursing program, the first program of this type in the world.
At NINR, we’re proud to continue nursing’s commitment to school health. In the coming months, we will be announcing scientific events, funding opportunities and more. We hope you join us in supporting this important area of research.
Shannon N. Zenk, PhD, MPH, RN
Director, NINR
