Exploring the co-benefits of prevention in education

DATE
TYPE Prevention Centre News
The dialogue was facilitated by the Prevention Centre’s Head, Nadia Mastersson, and Scientific Advisory Committee member Associate Professor Jaithri Ananthapavan. It focussed on the co-benefits of prevention and explored how evidence can support mutually beneficial outcomes for the health and education sectors within school settings.
Policy-research dialogues are invaluable for bringing together researchers, policymakers, and practitioners to share perspectives, build connections, and identify evidence gaps and priorities. This dialogue provided a unique opportunity for understanding how the health sector could better support education colleagues in implementing and sustaining health and wellbeing in school settings.
– Nadia Mastersson, Head, The Australian Prevention Partnership Centre
What are co-benefits?
Co-benefits of prevention are the non-health benefits that can arise across different sectors from a preventive health strategy or initiative. These can include economic, educational, environmental and social benefits. For example, a school program that promotes physical activity can improve student health and also boost engagement and academic outcomes.
A rapid review published by the Prevention Centre showed that most health interventions in education settings also improve educational outcomes. This highlights the importance of collaboration across sectors. Health, wellbeing and chronic disease prevention are influenced by social, environmental and commercial factors. Therefore, strategies to address these issues must go beyond the health sector to be truly effective.
Prevention cannot be achieved without collaboration across non-health sectors. To better prioritise actions to optimise societal outcomes, it is essential to value the full range of impacts from interventions and demonstrate the broader benefits of preventive approaches across government sectors.
– Associate Professor Jaithri Ananthapavan
Key insights
Several key insights emerged from the dialogue that are crucial in shaping education’s approach to health interventions. These insights help guide how health initiatives can be effectively integrated into schools, addressing both immediate needs and long-term goals.
Key factors supporting decision-making in schools
Education representatives highlighted outcomes central to their priorities, such as student engagement, cognitive and mental health outcomes, trauma-informed practices, and the immediate impacts of health interventions.
- Data and evidence: Schools need clear, context-specific and consistent data on the costs, benefits, and feasibility of interventions to support their decision-making.
- Business cases and legislative backing: Clear, evidence-based business cases for health programs that align with educational priorities can help secure leadership and policy support.
- Contextualised programs: Schools require flexible interventions or program implementation that aligns with their unique contexts, resources and needs.
- Evaluation frameworks: Demonstrating both short- and long-term impacts is essential to gain and sustain support for health initiatives.
- Stakeholder engagement: Collaborating with school councils, policymakers, and community organisations ensures alignment and broad buy-in.
Lessons learned from implementing health and wellbeing policies and programs in schools
Discussion on the barriers, enablers, challenges and strategies for implementing and sustaining health and wellbeing policies in schools highlighted key opportunities for the future.
Enablers for implementing and sustaining health initiatives
Several factors support the successful implementation and sustainability of health programs in schools.
- Integration of health into education: Programs like TransformUs, which incorporate physical activity into the curriculum, demonstrate the power of aligning health and educational goals.
- Co-designing initiatives: Co-designing initiatives with educators, students and the school community from the beginning ensures they are tailored to fit the specific context of schools, including their infrastructure, staff turnover, leadership dynamics, and executive support.
- Leveraging existing systems: Schools play a significant role in promoting health, and leveraging existing systems in educational settings can enhance the sustainability of health initiatives.
- Champions and leadership: Strong school leadership and local champions are critical for the successful adoption and integration of health initiatives.
- Intersectoral partnerships: Collaborating between health, education, community organisations and parents enhances the effectiveness of health interventions.
- Consistency and stability: Schools prefer stable, continuous programs that don’t change frequently. Sustained initiatives are seen as more effective.
Challenges for implementing and sustaining health initiatives
Several challenges persist when it comes to implementing and maintaining health initiatives in schools.
- Resource limitations: Insufficient funding, staff and infrastructure pose significant hurdles to implementation.
- Policy and bureaucracy: Policies seen as controversial can lead to public and political scrutiny, undermining long-term success.
- Staff turnover: High turnover disrupts program continuity and the retention of school champions.
- Time constraints: Schools require substantial time to implement and embed health and wellbeing initiatives. Understanding that these changes are a long-term commitment, not quick fixes, is essential.
- Measuring progress: Defining and tracking indicators of progress towards long-term health outcomes is necessary but can be complex, particularly in educational settings.
- Lack of clear frameworks: The perceived lack of a clear framework to guide the implementation and scaling of health programs across different school settings can result in disparate approaches and challenges with scalability and evidence-based practice.
Strategies for success
To overcome these challenges, the following strategies can support the success of health initiatives in schools.
- Professional development: Equip teachers with the skills to integrate health initiatives into their daily routines.
- Long-term funding: Stable financial support helps overcome disruptions caused by leadership or policy changes.
- Engaging and co-designing with stakeholders: Collaborating with various stakeholders and establishing clear roles can enhance the success of health initiatives.
- Shared understanding: Building a common understanding and shared language between the health and education sectors fosters collaboration and trust.
Opportunities and next steps
The dialogue highlighted key opportunities to improve collaboration and embed health programs within schools. These opportunities include integrating health initiatives with educational goals, building intersectoral partnerships, and involving researchers in educational settings to strengthen outcomes. The discussion emphasised the need for tailored, context-specific solutions. It also stressed the importance of strong evaluation frameworks and consistent metrics to measure the dual benefits for health and education.
Schools operate within a complex ecosystem of health policies, community engagement, and social determinants of health. The conversation reaffirmed that schools play a critical role in preventive health and that by health and education working together, we can create healthier, more equitable futures for young Australians.
The Prevention Centre values the time and expertise contributed by all participants in the dialogue. We have connected participants to the work of our research partners to share evidence that supports many of the challenges and opportunities identified in the dialogue. This includes the work of the National Centre of Implementation Science, particularly on sustaining implementation and the TransformUs program that integrates movement into core subjects, by the Institute of Physical Activity and Nutrition (IPAN) at Deakin University. By facilitating connections, the Prevention Centre will also support further collaboration between policy, practice and research to address evidence gaps that were highlighted in the session.