School Health Education
Healthy Class of 2010
The Healthy Class of 2010 (HC 2010), a multi-year campaign to promote health and prevent disease among sixth grade students enrolled in Pittsburgh Public Schools. The Healthy Class of 2010 represents a unique collaboration between the Center for Minority Health (CMH), Graduate School of Public Health at the University of Pittsburgh and the Pittsburgh Public Middle Schools. Its focus on building partnerships between the public health community and school administrators, educators, students and families has enabled a unique opportunity to begin to address student health issues and tailor relevant interventions to meet community needs towards the elimination of health disparities.
Initiated in the 2003-2004 academic year, the goals of this program are: 1) to enable staff to systematically engage every student who entered sixth grade in 2003 in “active living”; and 2) to increase students’ knowledge, attitudes and healthy choices regarding physical activity, nutrition and a tobacco-free lifestyle. Working in partnership with the Pittsburgh Public School System and the Allegheny County Health Department, program staff in the Graduate School of Public Health tracks students’ progress toward achieving these goals over a seven-year period, through their graduation in the year 2010. Importantly, their graduation date coincides with the deadline set for Healthy People 2010, the nation’s health promotion and disease prevention agenda, making the implementation of this program particularly opportune. The CMH’s goal is for the Class of 2010 to be the healthiest group of students to ever graduate from the Pittsburgh Public School System. Contact: Dr. James Butler
