Improving health and school nutrition for Vietnamese children

From March 14-15, in Vinh Phuc, Save the Children in collaboration with Mars Wrigley Foundation organized a workshop to share about school health work and summarize the "School Health and Nutrition" Project.

Nâng cao sức khỏe và dinh dưỡng học đường cho trẻ em Việt Nam

The "School Health and Nutrition" project is being implemented in three Asian countries, including China, the Philippines and Vietnam. (Source: Save the Children)

The project has been implemented over the past 12 years (2011-2024) in 125 kindergartens, primary schools and secondary schools in Ha Dong (Hanoi), Hai Phong, Ho Chi Minh City and Tien Giang. The workshop not only evaluated the effectiveness of project activities but also provided an opportunity for partners to share lessons learned and good models in school health work in Vietnam.

The workshop was attended by representatives from the Ministry of Health, the Ministry of Education and Training, sponsor representatives, and nearly 100 delegates from the Departments of Education and Training in many localities across the country.

Sharing at the event, Mr. Le Van Tuan, senior expert of the Department of Physical Education, Ministry of Education and Training, said that the Ministry highly appreciated the results achieved by the project, as well as the cooperation and support of Save the Children for the Ministry to improve the quality of school health care in recent times.

Mr. Le Van Tuan pointed out some outstanding achievements that can be mentioned as the coordination in developing and promulgating a set of documents under the program "Training to improve capacity for school health workers" according to Decision No. 354/QD-BGDDT dated January 22, 2024, cooperation in developing Circular No. 18/2023-TT-BGDDT and supporting the organization of many seminars and conferences on the topic of school health.

The representative of the Ministry of Education and Training emphasized: "School health care requires close coordination between ministries, departments, sectors, localities and international organizations such as Save the Children to improve the qualifications of school health care staff, improve facilities, and increase propaganda activities to raise awareness for students, parents and the community."

Hội thảo không chỉ đánh giá hiệu quả các hoạt động dự án mà còn là cơ hội để các đối tác chia sẻ các bài học kinh nghiệm và những mô hình tốt trong công tác y tế trường học tại Việt Nam. (Nguồn: Save the Children)

The workshop not only evaluated the effectiveness of project activities but also provided an opportunity for partners to share lessons learned and good models in school health work in Vietnam. (Source: Save the Children)

The “School Health and Nutrition” project is being implemented in three Asian countries (China, the Philippines and Vietnam) with the aim of improving the health and learning outcomes of school-age children through increased use of school-based health and nutrition services.

In Vietnam, the project interventions are built on a joint effort to implement the National Strategic Goals of the School Health Program through each phase 2011-2015, 2016-2020 and 2021-2025.

Not only stopping at familiar school health and nutrition contents such as oral health, age-appropriate nutrition, periodic health check-ups, and vision protection for children, the project also expands to many "hot" topics of interest such as: gender and sex, reproductive health, mental health, gender-based school violence...

Through 6 implementation phases, the project has supported the improvement of school facilities including 122 hand washing areas, toilets, nutritional gardens, organized more than 30,000 classes integrating knowledge of oral health care, school health, 460 school-level communication events and organized activities with 196 clubs.

According to the final survey in December 2023, the proportion of students, caregivers and teachers who improved their knowledge, attitudes and health care behaviors after participating in the project was 70.9%, 49.3% and 50.3% respectively. In the 2022-2023 school year alone, the proportion of students who rated the toilets as clean and safe increased by 16.4% compared to the previous year, and this was also the main reason for the toilet usage rate at school reaching 84.5%.

Linking schools, parents and students has become an important factor in enhancing school wellness practices, with 98.6% of parents participating in the text message program sharing and applying these topics with their children at home.

With these positive results, the project's intervention model has been replicated in 142 additional schools outside the project and received positive feedback from localities. At the same time, 100% of the schools participating in the project committed to maintaining and replicating educational and communication activities on school health in the future.

In particular, the project has cooperated with the Ministry of Education and Training in supporting the development of a set of documents under the program "Training to improve capacity for school health workers" issued under Decision No. 354/QD BGDĐT dated January 22, 2024.

Toàn cảnh Hội thảo. (Nguồn: Save the Children))

Overview of the Workshop. (Source: Save the Children))

Save the Children is an international non-governmental organization working to ensure the survival, protection, development and participation of children worldwide, founded in the United Kingdom in 1919 and currently operating in approximately 116 countries.

Save the Childre began operating in Vietnam in 1990. Since then, the organization has expanded its activities to six main program areas including: Education, health and nutrition; Child protection; Child rights governance; Poverty reduction for children and youth; Disaster risk reduction and climate change response.

In all its programmes, the organisation promotes rights-based approaches and focuses on ethnic minority children, migrant children, children with disabilities and the special needs of children and young people of all genders. Save the Children currently operates in 22 provinces across the country and has partnerships with government agencies, civil society organisations, the business sector and research institutes.

The Mars Wrigley Foundation was established with the desire to improve physical and mental health, enhance quality of life and spread happiness to the community, through educational projects, oral health care, promoting innovation in rural areas and strengthening social connections.

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