By Bill Grubb
News Editor

ROGERSVILLE - Coordinated School Health (CSH) programs are working and are definitely making a difference, according to Erika Phillips who oversees the Hawkins County School System's program.
    In a recent presentation to the Hawkins County Board of Education, Phillips noted the state's CSH program was the brain-child of former school system nurse Connie Givens, who served as the program's executive director until her death.
    "Before Coordinated School Health there were lots of different programs in the school system. The problem was nobody had any idea what anybody else was doing, so there were a lot of gaps and overlaps," Phillips explained.
    CSH is a systematic approach that contains eight components: health education; physical education; student, family and community involvement; health services; nutrition services; healthy school environment; counseling, psychological and social services and staff wellness.
    Phillips said one of the goals of the Hawkins County program is to provide preventive examinations for students in the kindergarten, second, fourth, sixth and eighth
grade levels as well as high school wellness classes.           
    "Students have received hearing, vision, height, weight and blood pressure screenings.   We feel like for a lot of children who don't make it to the doctor on a regular basis this is a good way for them to get those screenings," she explained.
    She also noted health problems, such as poor hearing or vision or headaches caused by high blood pressure can have a negative impact on a student's ability to concentrate and do school work.
    One of the major accomplishments of the Hawkins County CSH program was applying for and receiving more than $390,000 in federal grant funds through he Carolyn M. White Physical Education Program.
    The grant funding is being used to build  walking trails at 12 elementary schools, with five sill in in progress.  New playground equipment and ground cover will be added to improve playground safety at each school.        The grand is also funding active gaming' technology for the Physical Education programs at all 17 of our schools will provide each school with cutting edge physical education equipment such as Dance, Dance Revolution, Nintendo Wii, Wii Fit, Computerized stationary bikes, and the Xavix gaming system.
    Phillips said the advanced gaming systems are a key part of the program, because of the popularity among the students.
    "I know it might sound odd that we were buying video games for the schools through the grant for the schools but they are very popular," she said.  "The kids get to use these pieces of equipment in the physical education classes and teachers say that kids who weren't excited about it before are now excited to come to class so it has been a success."
    Phillips noted at Hawkins Elementary instructor Karen Price is going to use a "Winter Olympics" theme.
    The local CSH program has also been responsible for bringing nearly $50,000 in grant funds to Hawkins County for dealing with tobacco use prevention, nutrition and physical activity.
    Although the future of the entire CSH program is uncertain due to Tennessee's budget constraints, Phillips said the program can show positive results.
    "In 2007, 41.2 percent of our children were overweight.  We have dropped down, just in the time it (CSH) has been in place, to 39.5 percent so it is definitely working," she said.  "Hopefully, next year we will get our funding and can continue to make improvements."
    According to Phillips the fate of the program will depend on the state's budget.    
    "At this point the program is funded on stimulus money, the ARRA (American Recover an Reinvestment Act) funds. We are hoping we will get our funding back in the recurring funds in the Tennessee Department of Education Budget.  That is still kind of up in the air," Phillips said.  "The legislators all seem to be in favor of the program so we are just waiting to see what happens."