[Thorpe] Welcome to Beyond the Data.
I'm Dr. Phoebe Thorpe, and here
with me today is Dr. Kathleen Ethier, the division director
for the division of adolescent school and health here at CDC.
Hi Kathleen, thank you so much for joining us.
[Ethier] Thanks for having me.
[Thorpe] Today's session is about adolescent health,
and they just seem to change before our eyes.
They go from children to young adults,
but it's a very important time in their life...
[Ethier] Yeah.
[Thorpe] A lot of experimenting and their learning things.
[Ethier] Yeah.
[Thorpe] Why is it so important for public health
to focus on adolescents?
[Ethier] Overall, adolescents are a very healthy population,
but it's really the time in life when, as you mentioned,
behaviors, we start to experiment with behaviors,
and start to have experiences as we go out into the broader world
that really set the stage
for where adolescents go into adulthood.
So, although in our data,
and we use the youth risk behavior survey
which is a biennial survey of high school students
in the country, we are seeing
that while adolescents are making better decisions
about their sexual behavior about substance use,
there are still things that they're experiencing
like bullying, like school-based violence,
and they're experiencing increased mental health problems
and increased suicidal thoughts and behaviors
that really are cause for concern.
And so as they start to move from being children
into being adolescence and into adulthood, what we want
to do is really set the stage for a healthy adulthood.
[Thorpe] You hit it on the head.
Teachers, parents, care providers we all worry
about risky behavior risky situations,
but we've also been hearing a lot about the need
to encourage protective factors.
What what can you tell us about that?
[Ethier] Yeah.
In one of the things I think that's really encouraging is
that all of the things that I mentioned sexual behavior,
substance use, violence victimization,
and mental health, and suicidal issues really have some common
school and family based protective factors
that we know what to do about.
And so, I think things like family connectedness
and school connectedness are really things
that we can help teach families and schools how to do
and really set the stage well into adulthood
to help kids become healthy adults.
[Thorpe] And there's some more information
about the long-lasting effect of the protective factors.
Can you tell me a little bit more about that?
[Ethier] Yes.
We recently published a paper on a study that looked
at adolescents between 7th and 12th grades
and then the latest wave of data is when they are between 24
and 30 years of age, and what were seeing is that youth
who feel more connected to their families and more connected
in their schools are less likely to have had a STI,
to have engaged in substance use, to have been the victim
of violence, and are less likely to have emotional distress
and suicidal thoughts then those who feel less connected
to their families or to their schools.
And so, this new data really kind of brings home for us
that what we've known for a long time which is the importance
of connectedness during adolescence really has these
kind of amazing long life impacts.
Yeah. [Thorpe] Long life impacts.
It's amazing.
[Ethier] Yeah, yeah.
[Thorpe] So we have a new school year coming up.
And what can we help what we do for schools,
so that they can improve this protective factors
and reduce risk?
[Ethier] So schools are really an important source
of intervention with youth, but there are
about 26 million middle schoolers
and high schoolers in this country.
And so, we know what to tell schools about how
to improve connectedness.
There is a really very specific set
of things that schools can do.
They can provide professional development for their educators
around classroom management.
And you might say why classroom management, but if you've been
in a poorly managed classroom, you know that there is a sense
of chaos, there is a lack of safety, there's a sense
that bullying, and other things can happen.
So really making sure that teachers have everything
that they need in order to manage their classroom
as well is a really important thing that schools can do.
Another thing that schools can do is to bring communities
into schools and kids into their communities.
So they can do that through bringing in mentoring programs
into schools from community-based organizations
or from parent groups, and they can also provide opportunities
for service learning.
So getting kids out of their schools
and into their communities to provide service
to give back to their communities.
And then a third thing
that schools can do is they can provide opportunities
for students to lead clubs, to set a sense of inclusiveness,
and a sense of safe space for all students.
And doing those things really changes kind of the environment
of the school in ways that we've been able to demonstrate,
make kids feel more connected, and then also improves behavior
and improves the experiences that they're having.
So schools are an important a really important place
in which to do those things.
[Thorpe] Go ahead.
I was going to say and I hope that there are there things
that CDC is doing to help schools?
[Ethier] There are.
So we currently fund local education agencies
around the country.
We fund 28 of them right now,
and what we do is we encourage those districts to get
out into their middle schools and their high schools
to put a couple of things in place.
One is to provide quality health education to make sure
that you have the knowledge and skills that they need
to make healthy decisions.
The second thing that we ask them to do is we ask them to set
up referral systems between their middle schools
and high schools and sources of youth friendly care both
in their schools through school based health centers
but also in their communities.
And then the third thing we ask school districts to do is
to do all the things that I just mentioned
to increase connectedness.
What we found is that when schools do all
of those things it really has an impact on the behavior
and the experiences of the kids in their schools.
And so, while we're only able to reach a small proportion
of those 26 million youth,
we know that doing those things really works.
[Thorpe] And every bit helps.
Other important part here are parents.
[Ethier] Yes.
[Thorpe] Yes.
Parents are always important.
[Ethier] Yeah.
[Thorpe] They're caregivers.
What can they do to make their youth feel their kids feel
more connected?
[Ethier] So they can do a number of things as well.
The degree to which families and caregivers are really involved
in the lives of their kids is an important is a really important
part of helping kids feel connected.
And that can be everything from kind of just knowing
who your kids are, what's their favorite color, what do they
like to do, really knowing your kids then being involved
in their activities and spending time with them
and that can be everything from hanging out,
having a meal together, going out and doing things.
So really staying involved.
Another thing that parents and caregivers can do is to know
where their kids are,
what they're doing, and who they're with.
We sometimes call that parental monitoring.
That's an important protective factor for adolescents,
and it's particularly important to know those things
where they're going, who they're going, who they're with,
and what they're doing in the after school hours.
So those after school hours are really important times for kids
when they're out and they're in their communities and they're
with their friends, and so, it's important
to know what they're doing.
And then, I think the other thing
that parents can really do is to just continue
to have those conversations.
So using time when you're in the car,
using time when you're having dinner, using time, you know,
when they're getting ready to go to bed
and they're finishing their homework
to ask important questions to just really let those kids know
that you're interested, and you're aware, and your kind
of keeping track of what they're doing.
All of those things contribute to kids' feelings
of connectedness are really important protective behaviors.
[Thorpe] These are all really, really important
and very fundamental but important things.
Do you, if somebody wanted to find
out more where would they go?
[Ethier] So you can go to cdc.gov/healthyyouth,
and there you'll find all of our resources for parents,
for communities, and for schools.
And you're welcome to reach out to us, and we're happy to help.
[Thorpe] Yeah.
Well thank you so much for joining us.
Your work is amazing.
[Ethier] Thank you so much.
Thanks for having me.
[Thorpe] And thank you so much for joining us.
See you next time on Beyond the Data.