I have never seen a discussion of the link between youngsters' health and their academic performance. Yet one clearly exists. This means that increasing academic achievement will require attending to health in the broadest sense. The Commission finds that education and health are inextricably intertwined.
Any health problem can interfere with learning.
Health education, with its focus on helping children learn the knowledge and skills to be healthy, can be a vital part of a basic education. In many states, standards have been developed for subjects like mathematics, history, science and language arts, and tests developed to determine if students have met these standards. The fact that many states have neither standards for health education nor adopted the excellent National Health Education Standards suggests that many people in leadership may not consider the health of children as a basic. There is a practical reason for every state to develop a coordinated health education program that includes comprehensive health instruction in every grade. That practical reason is academic performance.