Rochdale Healthy Schools Programme

Name
Rochdale Healthy Schools Programme
Summary

The aim of the Rochdale Healthy Schools Programme is to improve the health and wellbeing of children and young people across the borough. Our schools have embraced the programme with 99% having achieved the status and providing a consistent, quality-assured, standardised programme of health-based work for children and young people.

52 per cent of our schools have now progressed onto the 'enhancement model' that addresses local and national health priorities for children and young people and provides evidence of the impact on the outcomes for health.

The Government has stated its continuing commitment to Personal, social, health and economic (PSHE) education and Healthy Schools as a means to improve the health and well being of children and young people.

This is reflected in the national ​curriculum​:

  • Personal, social, health and economic (PSHE) education is an important and necessary part of all pupils’ education
  • All schools should teach PSHE, drawing on good practice, and this expectation is outlined in the introduction to the national curriculum

The OFSTED framework 2015 for Personal development, behaviour and welfare states ‘Inspectors will make a judgement on the personal development, behaviour and welfare of children and learners by evaluating the extent to which the provision is successfully promoting and supporting children’s and other learners’.​ One of the key points is:​

  • Knowledge​​​ of how to keep themselves healthy, both emotionally and physically, including through exercising and healthy eating

In the Government’s ‘Childhood obesity: a plan for action’ published in 2016 it states that:

  • Schools are a vital part of our plan, and have opportunities to support healthier eating, physical activity and to shape healthy habits
  • From September 2017, we'll introduce a new voluntary healthy rating scheme for primary schools to recognise and encourage their contribution to preventing obesity by helping children to eat better and move more. This scheme will be taken into account during Ofsted inspections
  • Building on existing schemes where appropriate, the criteria for the rating scheme will be developed in consultation with schools and experts but will cover the school’s approach as a whole

Rochdale Schools are well placed for any new changes as our current Healthy Schools Programme will be incorporated into any new initiative from the Government’s Childhood Obesity Plan.​

Contact us for more information about t​he Rochdale Healthy Schools Programme.

Document type
Strategy