The healthy schools toolkit to assist school development planning for health is a practical guide to assessing and improving a school’s health.

It contains practical advice, examples and resources and is published as a PDF document.

The toolkit will help principals and staff to consider the elements that make a school a healthy place, and is offered as part of the drive to fulfil the various outcomes and targets set within Investing for Health.

A4, 62 pages, PDF file available here (1.1mb) (Please note that a request form must be completed before gaining access to the PDF document)

Principals and staff at schools across Northern Ireland.

Informed by the outcomes of the pilot Healthy Schools initiative (2002-2006), which worked with 15% of schools across Northern Ireland, the Health Promotion Agency for Northern Ireland (HPA) has developed this toolkit to assist school development planning for health and wellbeing through a whole school approach.

Teachers in Northern Ireland have helped to shape the toolkit by testing it out in practice with the support of the initiative’s coordinators in each Education and Library Board.

The toolkit has been designed to assist schools to meet the requirements of the Education (School Development Plans) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2005, which require schools to ensure that they safeguard and promote the health and wellbeing of their staff and pupils. It will also be useful for those schools working to become extended schools.