Rosehall High School Case Study

Rosehall High School had for many years been operating as a health promoting school and South Coatbridge's successful application in 1999 for Social Inclusion Partnership (SIP) status provided the opportunity to design and develop the Healthy Lifestyle project.

The project targets health behaviours, self-esteem and raising achievement with socially disadvantaged young people and complements health promoting schools and Hungry for Success.

Within the Healthy Lifestyle project a cyclical planning model is in place:

• audit – projects based on local need
• project development – develop initiative and implement
• evaluation – project tries to evaluate all initiatives – external evaluation by Kevin Lowden, Senior Researcher, Scottish Council for Research in Education (SCRE), Glasgow University
• amend and adjust – using review and evaluation make appropriate amendments and adjustments.

The Healthy Lifestyle project tries to ensure that initiatives it is developing are based on evidence; hence the need for the audit and evaluation aspects of the project.

In addition to this they do not want the initiatives to be seen as ‘bolt-on’ but indeed very much part of the curriculum and a whole school approach to health improvement.

Rugby

The Community Youth Rugby Initiative is just one part of a range of health promoting activities that have been developed. In total seven secondary schools in the area are involved in the community rugby initiative with the main aims as follows.

• To consolidate a community link between all the surrounding secondary schools and the local rugby club, Waysiders/Drumpellier RFC.
• To plan, organise and deliver a health education and coach education programme using the peer-led Youth Ambassador model. This model seeks to recruit, train and educate local young people in order to achieve sustainability for the initiative within the community.
• To provide a meaningful opportunity for locally recruited SVQ Sports Apprentices - in conjunction with the Healthy Lifestyle project, Scottish Rugby Union (SRU) and Waysiders/Drumpellier RFC - in order to build an inherent capability within the community.
• To provide a positive experience that raises self-esteem, social skills and awareness of others.
• To create a meaningful, positive experience, using rugby as a medium to promote improved health behaviour and a diversionary strategy away from youth crime in the local community.

To develop the initiative, the links between the schools and the Waysiders/Drumpelier Rugby Club were established. This was seen as an important aspect in building future sustainability and also in building capacity in the community.

This community link also provided the opportunity to develop locally recruited SVQ Sports Apprentices with a partnership between the Healthy Lifestyle project, the rugby club and the Scottish Rugby Union.

A key component of the initiative is the health and coach education programme. In total 58 young people participated in the programme, which consists of:

• first aid / emergency life skills
• Know Your Body (physiological/biological functioning in the context of healthy lifestyles)
• Eat Your Heart Out (healthy eating/nutrition)
• Foundation Level Rugby Coach Course.

The emphasis is on the participants having a healthy lifestyle, although in addition to this, the social and cultural aspects of rugby as well as the feeling of belonging to a community were reinforced throughout the initiative.

The initiative also included visits to two international rugby matches as well as a residential visit to Cork.

The initiative had a range of components over a period of a year including the following.

Particular learning points from the initiative have been as follows.

Participation

The project reached its objective of participation in the initiative of at least 50 young people. In total 103 young people started on the initiative and 58 completed. It was felt that some sort of follow-up with those who did not complete the programme would be of interest.

Programme

The programme was able to demonstrate that it had an immediate impact on participants’ health as well as being able to engage with disaffected young men. There were clear links with Curriculum for Excellence where the initiative enabled young people to become successful learners, confident individuals, responsible citizens and effective contributors.

Healthy lifestyle

The young people participating in the initiative said they had participated in the Healthy Lifestyle project at primary school before their involvement with the rugby initiative. Through this previous involvement they had been made aware of healthy lifestyles and this had been part of the reason for participating in rugby.

Crime diversion

One of the aims of the initiative was to divert young people away from crime and it was found that the rugby initiative had provided the young people with a healthy activity which kept them off the street and out of bother.

The use of rugby for the initiative has created the opportunity for young people to:

• raise their self-esteem
• build social skills
• develop healthy lifestyles
• work as a team
• develop relationships and friendships with people from other areas and schools.

Tackling sectarianism

This last point is important when looking at issues relating to sectarianism and religious intolerance. In January 2006 Scotland's First Minister, Jack McConnell, announced that Roman Catholic and non-denominational schools in Scotland are to be twinned in an attempt to tackle the country's sectarian divide.

The proposals were that denominational and non-denominational schools should come together for activities such as drama, sport and school trips. The outcome would be an increase in interaction between faith and non-faith schools and more co-operation in activities outside school hours.

'Sectarianism has damaged Scotland's reputation for far too long. It is time to stamp it out. This is a national effort, and we all have a part to play.'
First Minister Jack McConnell (January 2006)

The Healthy Lifestyle project had already been working in partnership with the Lanarkshire Global Education Centre, Sense Over Sectarianism and North Lanarkshire Council to plan and implement the Try2gether Religious Intolerance initiative.

This initiative included:

• a youth conference to challenge religious and racial intolerance, and stimulate discussion of sectarianism among local children
• the Community Youth Rugby Initiative to emphasise teamwork and co-operation
• a one-day visit to Auschwitz-Birkenau, which was organised by Coatbridge schools in conjunction with the Holocaust Education Trust. A memorial day was held at Rosehall after the trip.

The Healthy Lifestyle project is well-established within the area and there is a plan to continue the Community Youth Rugby initiative and build on the findings of the evaluation.

Using the planning model in place, the Healthy Lifestyle project will continue to deliver a broad range of initiatives including:

• Multi-disciplinary Training Programme – this programme is for those delivering the primary school programme or the secondary school health science programme
• Whole School in the Community – embedding the teacher-provided programme within the curriculum
• Curriculum-based breastfeeding input – awareness and promotion programme.

Evaluation reports of these initiatives are available.

Charles Fawcett
Depute Headteacher
Rosehall High School
Woodhall Avenue
Coatbridge
ML5 5DB
Tel: 01236 437376
Email: Charles Fawcett
c.fawcett@rosehall.n-lanark.sch.uk