Health Promotion Evaluation and Research in Schools: Issues for Consideration

Abstract

Schools offer an attractive means for health promotion practitioners interested in improving the health of young people and therefore schools play a critical role as a setting for health promotion and public health program implementation. As a consequence schools are also settings in which evaluation and research is undertaken. This paper will discuss some broad issues that the literature suggests are important considerations for evaluation and research undertaken in school settings and discusses some of the practical implications of these considerations. Evaluation of school health promotion requires a balance between systematic, regulated research design and the variable, uncontrolled environment inherent in naturalistic settings. A clear understanding about the nature of the school setting, coupled with an evaluation targeted at the appropriate research phase and incorporating lessons learnt from previous interventions are various issues that need to be considered in well planned evaluations. A planning approach that takes into consideration the evaluation issues raised in this paper will help to ensure that appropriate and useful interventions and evaluations are developed, which also play an important role in contributing to the development of the field as a whole.