Dissonance and debates encircling 'health promoting schools'

Abstract

This critical commentary examines the differences between health promoting schools as a settings approach and health promotion in schools. The ideological and epistemological positions that these ways of working with or in schools represent have significant consequences in debates about implementation, evaluation, the nature of evidence and the criteria for success. This examination challenges some of the underlying thinking about health promoting schools demonstrated in statements in the Booth and Okely paper.