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Contact: Jill Thiare
Media Coordinator
State Tobacco Education and Prevention Partnership
(303) 692-3015
For Immediate Release Tuesday, July 13, 2004
Colorado Participates in National School Employee Wellness Feasibility Assessment Project
DENVER—Three Colorado school districts have been awarded small grants to launch school employee wellness feasibility assessment pilot projects when school resumes this fall.
The districts and grant amounts are Pueblo School District 60, $2,000; Summit County RE-1 School District, $2,000; and Center 26-HT School District in the San Luis Valley, $1,000. The grants were awarded by the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment from funds allocated to Colorado from the National Directors of Health Promotion and Education project.
Colorado was one of a total of five states and one U.S. territory awarded $5,000 each for the project. The other grantees include the states of Connecticut, North Carolina, Rhode Island and Texas and the U.S. territory of the Virgin Islands.
“Keeping teachers healthy is very important,” said Katy Kupecz, director of youth programs with the State Tobacco Education and Prevention Partnership at the Department of Public Health and Environment. “When school employees adopt healthier behaviors, they not only reinforce healthy habits among students, they are also more capable of meeting students’ learning and developmental needs. We anticipate that the School Employee Wellness Feasibility Assessment Project will shed some light on what will work best to help district employees lead healthier lives.”
Pueblo School District 60 is a Steps to a Healthier Colorado grantee; Summit RE-1 School District is a Coordinated School Health Infrastructure grantee; and Center 26-HT School District is a State Tobacco Education and Prevention Partnership Master Settlement Agreement grantee.
The districts will use the school employee wellness guide, “Protecting Our Assets: Promoting and Preserving School Employee Wellness,” which contains methods schools and school districts can use in implementing activities to enhance the health and wellness of all school personnel. The guide is designed to help schools, districts and states develop and support strong school employee wellness programs.
Lisa Perry, a senior consultant who coordinates school health and physical activities for the Colorado Department of Education and who is assisting with the project, said, “Teachers and staff are schools’ most valuable assets and should be treated as such. Every school day, nearly 47,000 teachers in Colorado instruct our children, more than 3,600 school administrators manage our schools and well over 48,700 staff transport, feed and otherwise care for our children and ensure that the buildings and grounds where students spend their school days are safe and well maintained.”
Perry explained that the programs will be designed to promote health, prevent health risk behaviors and address conditions that can compromise school employee health which in turn may reduce productivity, increase health care costs and hamper student success.
The outcomes of these pilot projects will allow the National Directors of Health Promotion and Education to determine how and how well the school employee wellness guide supports schools in implementing these programs.
Bev Samek, a school health coordinator in Pueblo School District 60, said, “Teachers and staff who are healthy, both emotionally and physically, are an invaluable asset to a school. Students, families and community members reap significant rewards because healthy school employees are more energetic and the general school climate is more optimistic.”
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