News

Broad base of leaders invited to tackle kids' needs

By Bill Moss, Published: May 14, 2013

Six years after the last examination of kids' needs resulted in better school-based health care, a local agency is launching a new review of what children need and how the community can best meet the need.

The Children and Family Resource Center this week will kick off a new round of the United Agenda for Children, which in 2007 identified health care as a priority and led to more school nurses and school-based clinics.
The resource center has invited a who's who of community leaders to the introductory meeting on Friday morning at the Mike's on Main upstairs meeting room. Leaders in business, schools, health care, charities and human services will see an assessment on where children stand now, hear about the five conditions that lead to well-being for children and a community, view video clips of successful programs already here, and begin talking about what Henderson County can do to make sure the positive conditions exist.
The resource center is using "The 5 Promises" approach developed by former Secretary of State Colin Powell and his wife, Alma, to identify successful strategies for helping children. Research by the National Academy of Science showed that children who experience at least four of the five promises are more likely to be successful in school, avoid violence and become involved in their community.
The promises are:
1. Caring Adults
2. Safe Places
3. A Healthy Start
4. An Effective Education
5. Opportunities to Serve
The Speak Out for Kids event in 2007 identified seven priorities for improving the lives of children after a summit that attracted 300 people. The priorities were:
• Provide school nurses at nationally-recommended levels (1 nurse to every 750 students).
• Increase safe, affordable housing.
• Increase access to preschool through additional funding for child care subsidies and additional preschool spaces.
• Increase mental health services for children in the community and in schools.
• Establish mentoring programs for at-risk kids.
• Provide alternatives for youth and teens – create social venues for them.
• Develop programs that help young people make post high school graduation plans.
Agencies, church leaders and civic groups have made progress in several areas, most notably in school nurses and school-based health clinics that respond basic physical health needs and have mental health counselors on duty as well.
"Thanks to the momentum that began with the Speak Out for Kids event," the CFRC said, a partnership raised the number of school nurses, and trimmed the nurse-to-student ratio from 1:2,538 in 2005-06 school year to 1:1,336 today. Agencies have opened three additional school based health centers (for a total of four). The Department of Public Health's School Nurse program, the Henderson County schools and Blue Ridge Community Health Services partnered to meet the need.
In other areas, the county adopted a minimum housing code and affordable housing units have increased. A new tele-mental health program using video will provide access to mental health services to all students in middle and high schools.
The poverty rate for children in Henderson County, 25.3 percent, is greater than many people think.
Yet the county has many success stories, said Elisha Freeman, the executive director of the Children and Family Resource Center. Video clips about programs adopted by Flavor 1st in Mills River and Glenn C. Marlow principal John Bryant and an interview with Sierra Nevada owner Don Grossman about why he chose Mills River for the company's East Coast brewery.

At a planning meeting on Monday, CFRC board members and officials said one theme of the United Agenda for Children is that better outcomes for children go hand in hand with economic development and the recruiting of businesses that increasingly county quality of life as a factor in relocating or starting a plant.

The CFRC will spent the next year compling data and planning for a forum in 2014 that will lead to a ranking of priorities like the 2007 event did.