Abstract

Schools and districts nationwide have heavily emphasized supporting students’ health and wellbeing by engaging families and caregivers to truly support the “whole child,” as outlined in the Whole School, Whole Community, Whole Child (WSCC) model. The COVID-19 pandemic only heightened the important role of school and family partnerships in supporting children’s health. The Chicago Public Schools (CPS) Healthy CPS initiative is designed to support schools in their compliance with existing health and wellness policies to support child health. This study aimed to explore parents’ primary health concerns for their children, characterize these views, explore any alignment with WSCC, and identify recommendations for family engagement in school health promotion. Eleven semi-structured focus groups (seven English, four Spanish) were conducted with CPS parents/caregivers. Groups were conducted in spring 2021 on Chicago’s West Side, one of the more historically disinvested communities in the city. Focus groups were recorded, transcribed, and analyzed using constant comparison, incorporating both inductive and deductive approaches. Key themes emerged related to parents’ perceptions of schools’ role in promoting health including: (1) parents see child health as a shared responsibility between families and schools; and (2) parents identify significant structural barriers and inequities that impede child health, such as racism, community violence, and a lack of community resources in their neighborhoods, and believe schools can do more to address them. Parents’ viewed child health and wellbeing as multidimensional and stated that these dimensions must be considered holistically. Their views aligned with WSCC family engagement-related components. Parents recommended that schools employ a variety of strategies to engage families. Findings from this paper have implications for engaging families in school health policy and program development as well as implementation, particularly those in lower income, urban communities that have faced a history of structural inequities.

中文翻译：

---

让家庭参与支持整个孩子：芝加哥西区家长对儿童健康的看法

摘要

全国各地的学校和学区都非常重视支持学生的健康和福祉，让家庭和看护者真正支持“整体儿童”，如“整体学校、整体社区、整体儿童”(WSCC) 模式中所述。COVID-19 大流行进一步凸显了学校和家庭伙伴关系在支持儿童健康方面的重要作用。芝加哥公立学校 (CPS) 健康 CPS 计划旨在支持学校遵守现有的健康和保健政策，以支持儿童健康。本研究旨在探讨家长对孩子的主要健康问题，描述这些观点，探讨与 WSCC 的一致性，并确定家庭参与学校健康促进的建议。与 CPS 家长/看护者一起进行了 11 个半结构化焦点小组（7 个英语、4 个西班牙语）。小组活动于 2021 年春季在芝加哥西区进行，这是该市历史上投资撤资最多的社区之一。通过不断比较，结合归纳和演绎方法，对焦点小组进行记录、转录和分析。出现的关键主题与家长对学校在促进健康方面的作用的看法有关，包括：(1) 家长将儿童健康视为家庭和学校的共同责任；(2) 家长发现阻碍儿童健康的重大结构性障碍和不平等，例如种族主义、社区暴力和社区缺乏社区资源，并相信学校可以采取更多措施来解决这些问题。父母认为儿童的健康和福祉是多维度的，并表示必须全面考虑这些维度。他们的观点与 WSCC 家族参与相关的组成部分一致。家长建议学校采取多种策略来吸引家庭。本文的研究结果对于让家庭参与学校卫生政策和计划的制定和实施具有重要意义，特别是那些曾经面临结构性不平等历史的低收入城市社区。