HealthTeacher and Alignment
Nashville Team
To Provide Health Education
to 75,000 Students
Citywide Collaboration
Includes Schools, Health Department and Community Organizations
Nashville, Tenn.,
Dec. 13, 2007 - HealthTeacher™ and Alignment Nashville announced
today the addition of the HealthTeacher resources to Nashville's overall
health and wellness education toolbox. The resources involve both Internet
and Print versions to assist teachers and health professionals with
their lesson plan development for health education. This partnership
is made possible through a grant from the Healthways Foundation.
"A new community-based
health education model is being discussed, and Nashville has the opportunity
to be a model city," said Sydney Rogers, Executive Director of Alignment
Nashville. "The Harvard Family Research Project (HFRP) has recently
documented the idea that schools can't do it alone and that children
need access to a network of supports for learning and development. This
model, called complementary learning, intentionally links non-school
supports with each other and with schools to better ensure that all
children have the skills they need from birth through adulthood."
"HealthTeacher's
resources are aligned with our overall strategic initiatives for teaching
health education in the Metropolitan Nashville Public Schools (MNPS),"
said Dr. Tina Bozeman, Coordinator of Health, Wellness, P.E. and ROTC
for MNPS. "The new resources from HealthTeacher will assist our teachers
in addressing significant health and behavioral issues among our youth,
build health literacy, and help our teachers overcome many of the constraints
that now limit the provision of comprehensive and sequential health
education in the school setting."
HealthTeacher will also
be made available to community providers of health education who are
working through the Children's Health Initiative of Alignment Nashville.
"I's important that we all have a shared language when talking
with our children about health," said Jeff Dotts, Director of Alignment
Nashville's Children's Health Initiative. "Using HealthTeacher
as a resource will allow the messages in the schools to be echoed in
the community. It's a great opportunity to pull together the community."
In the future, these resources will be available to all agencies working
with Alignment Nashville Health Initiatives.
HealthTeacher with assistance
from the Health Department, other non-profits and Alignment Nashville,
is providing professional development for teachers and educators on
how to successfully use the new resources. The resources meet the National
Health Education Standards and consist of nine areas: Tobacco, Alcohol
and Other Drugs, Community and Environmental Health, Injury Prevention,
Mental and Emotional Health, Nutrition, Personal and Consumer Health,
Physical Activity and Family Health. The resources also address the
top six health risk behaviors identified by the U.S. Centers for Disease
Control and Prevention (CDC).
"Nashville is a very
diverse community with many health care needs," said Dr. Kimberlee
Wyche-Etheridge, Director of Family, Youth, and Infant Health for Metro
Public Health Department. "This program will help us deliver the right
messages to specific communities in need."
"Nashville is known
throughout the country as the silicon valley of health care. Now we
have a unique opportunity to become one of the healthiest cities for
children in the country," said J. Tod Fetherling, Chief Product Officer
of ConnectivHealth, the parent company of HealthTeacher. "We are excited
to collaborate with Alignment Nashville to provide our hometown with
this comprehensive educational resource and to measure the impact of
health education on one of the most livable cities in the world."
About Alignment Nashville
The purpose of Alignment
Nashville (AN) is to create a system to bring community organizations
and resources into alignment so their aligned support to Nashville's
youth has a positive impact on public school success and the success
of our community as a whole. MNPS has contributed administrative staff,
principals and office space, the Nashville Area Chamber of Commerce
has contributed office space, and generous philanthropists have donated
more than $700,000 for staffing and operations. More recently, the HCA
Foundation, the Healthways Foundation, and Amerigroup have also provided
funding for the Children's Health Initiatives. For more information,
please visit www.alignmentnashville.org.
About Metropolitan Nashville Public
Schools
Metro Nashville Public
Schools provide a range of educational opportunities to more than 74,000
students in Nashville and Davidson County. The governing body for MNPS
is the Metropolitan Nashville and Davidson County Board of Public Education,
a nine-member group elected by residents of Metropolitan Nashville.
For more information, please visit www.mnps.org.
About ConnectivHealth
ConnectivHealth is a
network of powerful health information brands that enables the delivery,
distribution and organization of important health information for physicians,
health care professionals, hospitals and schools through customized
channels. Each brand serves a critical information need in the marketplace
with the single goal of improving health. Privately held, the ConnectivHealth
network includes: PeerClip, HealthTeacher, VerusMed and Discovery Hospital.
HealthTeacher is a leading provider of health education resources for
kindergarten through 12th grade with more than 7,500 schools
in 60 countries. The company's investors include Petra Capital Partners
of Nashville, Chrysalis Ventures of Louisville, Ky., and members of
the management team. For more information, e-mail us at info@connectivhealth.com.