School employee wellness programs can help improve teacher health, reduce district costs, and even improve student learning. "When teachers are healthy, there's decreased staff absenteeism, which means there's less interruption of continuity of instruction in the classroom," says Eva Marx, school health consultant from Hingham, Mass.
A well-designed wellness program does more than make people feel better, contend Marx and Beverly Samek, director of coordinated school health programs at Pueblo School District 60 in Colorado. Their ASCD Conference on Teaching and Learning session, titled "Teacher Wellness: The Connection to Student Health and Learning," argued that employee wellness programs can lead to "systemic change in how the school or district functions."
Not a Job for Sissies
Teachers' working conditions cause unique health problems. Poor indoor air quality at many schools means teachers are more prone than other workers to asthma and chronic respiratory infections, says Samek.
Schools are noisy places. Making yourself heard above the din can cause a variety of voice disorders.
Sometimes even the calendar and school-day schedule can conspire against teacher health. Spending 10 months a year standing up leads to foot problems for many teachers. Marx says teachers experience high rates of bladder infection; she speculates that limited time to use the restroom may play a role.
Then there's stress, a significant concern for physical as well as mental health. "Classes that are too large, behavioral problems, and even fear of assault make stress a major issue," says Marx.
Implementing a health program sends an important message to faculty. "When teachers feel valued, they are more likely to stay in a district," Marx says. "With reports that more than a thousand teachers leave the profession every day, this is an increasing problem."
Investing in Teacher Health Pays Off
“Staff wellness has been a key to fiscal solvency for our district.”
—Participant in the “School Employee Wellness” session
Well-Planned Wellness
According to Samek, a well-coordinated school employee health program includes eight components:
- Health education;
- Physical education;
- Health services;
- Nutrition services;
- Counseling, psychological, and social services;
- Healthy school environment;
- Health promotion for staff; and
- Parent and community involvement.
Schools and school districts don't need to create wellness programs on their own. Health care professionals stand ready to assist. "Most districts do this in partnership with local public health departments or hospitals," Samek says. "That's their job, and they are happy to come in and help."
Schools themselves often have great resource people to consult. "Take a look at your physical education teachers, school nutrition staff, counselors, your nurse. That's a team right there that can come together and make employee wellness work in a school building," says Samek.
The results can be well worth the effort. An employee wellness program can literally pay for itself by reducing workers' compensation and disability claims and insurance costs.
"One district in Wisconsin actually found that their health insurance usage dropped from 35 percent to 5 percent over the course of two years" after implementing a wellness program, Marx says. "They used the savings from that improvement to increase employee salaries." Not only were teachers healthier, but so were their paychecks.