Mac, board lead student well-being initiative

Education ministry announces $3.1-million, four-year program to spur integrated ‘knowledge networks’

Hamilton will be leading the effort to equip Ontario schools with new resources to improve student wellbeing.

The Ministry of Education has announced that the Hamilton public school board and McMaster University’s Offord Centre for Child Studies have been chosen to spur the building of “knowledge networks” addressing in an integrated way: positive mental health; healthy schools; safe and accepting schools; equity and inclusive education.

These are the four “areas of focus” (emotional, physical, cognitive and social) in the ministry’s WellBeing Strategy.

“It’s very exciting,” says the Offord Centre’s Dr. Kathy Georgiades, of the announcement, which commits $1.3 million over four years through the Knowledge Network for Applied Education Research.

“Much of the research that has been done (relating to student wellbeing) has been in silos.”

The intent behind the new initiative is to understand and address the different strands of student well-being (everything from diet and nutrition to environmental conditions), not in isolation but as they interrelate, affecting everything from school performance to future adaptation in a fast-paced and interconnected economy and world at large.

“This recognizes the need to address research findings in a more applied way,” said Georgiades. “Sometimes in research there is a reluctance to connect with people who need to use the research.”

Her own work looks at the health of refugee children, and the Offord Centre in general has been instrumental in the Ontario Child Health Study, which involved 32,000 students and 248 schools. These are the kinds of inputs that will go into the “knowledge networks.”

“Educators have so many demands,” says Georgiades. “We will look at what is manageable and how to promote student well-being without over-burdening educators.”

Don Buchanan, knowledge mobilization officer with the Hamilton-Wentworth District School Board, says the board and the Offord Centre for Child Studies “have had a long relationship.”

“We’ve been developing great resources around areas like mental health. We’re trying to apply this evidence-based research, pulling together so we’re not reinventing wheels.”

“There aren’t simple solutions. We’ve got good evidence in individual areas but we’re trying to understand how they wrap around each other.”

Buchanan and Georgiades stress the importance of the four-year funding commitment.

“We’re not going to accomplish everything in 12 months,” says Buchanan.

“We need sustained partnerships,” says Georgiades.

The school board and Offord Centre were chosen after a competitive application process, according to the ministry.