This practice report outlines the application of culture change methodology to co-design a whole-of-university health and wellbeing strategy. We outline considerations that necessitate a change in the way higher education contributes to student and staff mental health and wellbeing. We provide an overview of an Appreciative Inquiry culture change…

Objective: To evaluate implementation of nutrition/physical activity-related policies/practices at colleges participating in a healthy campus initiative and campus health leaders' perceptions of policies/practices' support for student health and ease of/barriers to implementation. Participants: Health leaders at colleges participating in the…

Aboriginal people fare worse than other Australians in every measure of health, including in a ten-year gap in life expectancy, infant mortality, cardiovascular disease, dental disease, mental health, chronic disease and maternal health. Despite sustained government effort, progress to improve Aboriginal health has been very slow. The collective…

Many evaluations of programs tend to show few outcomes. One solution to this has been an increasing prominence of the movement that requires programs to implement evidence-based interventions (EBIs). But in a complex world with complex organizations and complex interventions, many challenges have arisen to the implementation of EBIs with fidelity…

The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) has set out to expand existing partnerships and form new alliances in order to take on the most pervasive challenges of our time: improving the health and well-being of everyone in America. It has formalized its commitment by bringing together its work under the thematic efforts of "Healthy Children,…

Policy scoping reviews are an effective method for generating evidence-informed policies. However, when applying guiding methodological frameworks to complex policy evidence, numerous, unexpected challenges can emerge. This paper details five challenges experienced and addressed by a policy trainee-led, multi-disciplinary research team, while…

Background: The school-based Dutch Obesity Intervention in Teenagers (DOiT) program is an evidence-based obesity prevention program. In preparation for dissemination throughout the Netherlands, this study aimed to adapt the initial program and to develop an implementation strategy and materials. Methods: We revisited the Intervention Mapping (IM)…

In 1997, American Evaluation Association member George Grob, now retired from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and currently President of the Center for Public Program Evaluation, made a testimony on Medicare home health care fraud and abuse before the U.S. Senate Special Committee on Aging. The occasion was to announce the…

This article describes a district-wide fitness challenge that was implemented by the elementary physical education program in the Waterford (Michigan) public schools. Its purpose was to (1) encourage students to be active outside of the classroom, (2) provide parents and families with information about the importance of fitness and physical…

Health education in New Zealand schools has a chequered history, peppered with controversy since its inclusion as a school subject in the early nineteenth century. In this paper we examine the trials and challenges faced by health education teachers over time, pointing to the particular components of this subject that are regarded as controversial…

Reducing health inequalities is a key priority for the Scottish Government. Health authorities are expected to meet quality targets. The involvement of people with learning disabilities in health service review teams has been one of the initiatives used in by National Health Service Quality Improvement Scotland to empower patients and improve…

Research has established that physical activity and participation in athletics provides important health and social benefits for children. Certain federal laws help ensure that kindergarten-12th grade schools provide students with disabilities opportunities to participate in physical education (PE) and extracurricular athletics equal to those of…

This report summarizes the roundtable "Infants and Toddlers in State and Federal Budgets: Yesterday's Choices, Today's Decisions, Tomorrow's Options" conducted by the Urban Institute, with support from the A.L. Mailman Family Foundation, on March 30, 2009. The roundtable's focus grew out of the widely perceived mismatch between sharply limited…

The author examines the traditional emphasis of health educators in preventive approaches to smoking behavior and suggests (through a brief literature review) specific techniques that may be useful in aiding those who would stop smoking. (MJB)

The number of overweight and obese children and adolescents has reached epidemic proportions, and recent federal surveys show that most school meals do not meet federal nutrition guidelines. Accordingly, there is growing interest in the nutritional quality of foods available in U.S. schools--and in the role of the government in helping to make…