Health News
- Clinton County Schools Will Go Tobacco-free In July 2016, Do Media Campaign To Prepare People For The Change
The Clinton County Board of Education has voted to make all of the county's school campuses tobacco free, but decided to not implement this program until the 2016 school year begins to give the public more time to adjust to the new rule, reports the...
- Lake Cumberland District Health Department Using Polls In An Effort To Get School Boards To Make Campuses Tobacco-free
Countywide smoking bans are unlikely to pass anytime soon in most of rural Kentucky, but more county school districts are making their campuses tobacco-free. Now a multi-county health department is trying to get rural school boards to do that, with public-opinion...
- Burgin, In Heart Of Kentucky, Is State's 40th School District To Go Tobacco-free; Ban, Won By Students, Applies To Vapor Products
Burgin Independent Schools, in the heart of Kentucky, will be the latest 100 percent tobacco-free schools in the state, and the first in Mercer County, which has a strong tobacco heritage. The Burgin Board of Education voted April 8 to ban all tobacco...
- Russell County School Board Makes All Campuses Tobacco-free, But Delays Implementation For One Year
The Russell County Board of Education has voted to make all the county's school campuses tobacco-free a year from now, "After some lengthy discussion by the board and visitors," The Times Journal of Russell Springs reports. The vote was 4-0, with...
- Non-profit Encourages Districts To Go Tobacco Free Inside And Outside Of Schools
In an op-ed piece in the Lexington Herald-Leader, Susan Zepeda, president and CEO of the Foundation for a Healthy Kentucky, encourages school districts to adopt comprehensive tobacco-free policies. "Many believe that schools are already tobacco-free,...
Health News
Casey joins Adair and Russell as longtime tobacco counties where schools are going tobacco-free; Clinton defers action
The schools in another longtime tobacco county in Southern Kentucky are going tobacco-free. With only one member in opposition, the Casey County Board of Education recently enacted a tobacco-free school policy beginning with the 2015-16 academic year, Abigail Whitehouse reports for The Casey County News.
Jelaine Harlow, health educator for the Lake Cumberland District Health Department, presented the board with letters from community partners supporting a tobacco-free school policy, and results from surveys that showed 70 percent of school parents in the county school support a tobacco-free school policy, Whitehouse reports.
The surveys included ones given to parents and students across the school district including a ninth-grade student survey, a teacher-opinion survey, and a parent survey. It also included opinion results from attendees at a Casey County basketball game that showed overwhelming support for tobacco-free policy.
The school board in Clinton County also heard a similar plea from the same health department, including a report that high-school sophomores' use of smokeless tobacco had increased, but took no action, the Clinton County News reports. The high-school principal noted that many school employees smoke.
The health department noted that school boards in Somerset, Adair County and Russell County had recently enacted tobacco-free policies. Since the end of the federal tobacco program in 2004, tobacco production in the area has sharply and steadily declined, leaving tobacco with little of the political support that once insulated it from government controls.
With school-board elections held this month, and not to be held for another two years, there may be more such votes in the near future.
Kentucky School Boards Association spokesman Brad Hughes said in an e-mail that as of June, 33 of the state's 173 school districts had adopted all-encompassing tobacco-free campus policies; 12 have adopted policies that only affect students and staff, with no restrictions for visitors and groups renting district facilities. Four have adopted tobacco-free policy language with exceptions, such as allowing smoking in personal vehicles or at outdoor events; and four have asked KSBA to draft tobacco-free policy language, but have not yet reported final adoption of those policies. Hughes noted that smoking by underage students is prohibited by law anywhere, including in schools, in buses and anywhere on campus.
Jelaine Harlow, health educator for the Lake Cumberland District Health Department, presented the board with letters from community partners supporting a tobacco-free school policy, and results from surveys that showed 70 percent of school parents in the county school support a tobacco-free school policy, Whitehouse reports.
The surveys included ones given to parents and students across the school district including a ninth-grade student survey, a teacher-opinion survey, and a parent survey. It also included opinion results from attendees at a Casey County basketball game that showed overwhelming support for tobacco-free policy.
Following Harlow?s presentation, Beverly Hoskins, who taught at Casey County High School for 30 years, voiced her support for a tobacco-free campus. She said her father's tobacco crop put her through college, but "has lost the two men she loved the most to smoking, first her father and then her husband," Whitehouse writes.
Board Chairman Ken Coffman first said the issue would be decided later, but member Marilyn Coffey said, ?Ken, I believe some of us are ready to vote. I think we?ve had a year to think about this and I?d like to make a motion to pass it and phase it in.? the motion carried, with only Vice Chairman John Cox opposed.
Board Chairman Ken Coffman first said the issue would be decided later, but member Marilyn Coffey said, ?Ken, I believe some of us are ready to vote. I think we?ve had a year to think about this and I?d like to make a motion to pass it and phase it in.? the motion carried, with only Vice Chairman John Cox opposed.
The school board in Clinton County also heard a similar plea from the same health department, including a report that high-school sophomores' use of smokeless tobacco had increased, but took no action, the Clinton County News reports. The high-school principal noted that many school employees smoke.
The health department noted that school boards in Somerset, Adair County and Russell County had recently enacted tobacco-free policies. Since the end of the federal tobacco program in 2004, tobacco production in the area has sharply and steadily declined, leaving tobacco with little of the political support that once insulated it from government controls.
With school-board elections held this month, and not to be held for another two years, there may be more such votes in the near future.
Kentucky School Boards Association spokesman Brad Hughes said in an e-mail that as of June, 33 of the state's 173 school districts had adopted all-encompassing tobacco-free campus policies; 12 have adopted policies that only affect students and staff, with no restrictions for visitors and groups renting district facilities. Four have adopted tobacco-free policy language with exceptions, such as allowing smoking in personal vehicles or at outdoor events; and four have asked KSBA to draft tobacco-free policy language, but have not yet reported final adoption of those policies. Hughes noted that smoking by underage students is prohibited by law anywhere, including in schools, in buses and anywhere on campus.
- Clinton County Schools Will Go Tobacco-free In July 2016, Do Media Campaign To Prepare People For The Change
The Clinton County Board of Education has voted to make all of the county's school campuses tobacco free, but decided to not implement this program until the 2016 school year begins to give the public more time to adjust to the new rule, reports the...
- Lake Cumberland District Health Department Using Polls In An Effort To Get School Boards To Make Campuses Tobacco-free
Countywide smoking bans are unlikely to pass anytime soon in most of rural Kentucky, but more county school districts are making their campuses tobacco-free. Now a multi-county health department is trying to get rural school boards to do that, with public-opinion...
- Burgin, In Heart Of Kentucky, Is State's 40th School District To Go Tobacco-free; Ban, Won By Students, Applies To Vapor Products
Burgin Independent Schools, in the heart of Kentucky, will be the latest 100 percent tobacco-free schools in the state, and the first in Mercer County, which has a strong tobacco heritage. The Burgin Board of Education voted April 8 to ban all tobacco...
- Russell County School Board Makes All Campuses Tobacco-free, But Delays Implementation For One Year
The Russell County Board of Education has voted to make all the county's school campuses tobacco-free a year from now, "After some lengthy discussion by the board and visitors," The Times Journal of Russell Springs reports. The vote was 4-0, with...
- Non-profit Encourages Districts To Go Tobacco Free Inside And Outside Of Schools
In an op-ed piece in the Lexington Herald-Leader, Susan Zepeda, president and CEO of the Foundation for a Healthy Kentucky, encourages school districts to adopt comprehensive tobacco-free policies. "Many believe that schools are already tobacco-free,...