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Wellness Resources and Community Connections

Whole School, Whole Community, Whole Child (WSCC) Model 

What is the WSCC Model and Why is it important?

The Whole School, Whole Community, Whole Child (WSCC), is a framework created by the CDC, to address school health and ensure the well-being of students, staff, and the environment. Implementing the Whole School, Whole Community, Whole Child (WSCC) model empowers schools to take effective and meaningful steps to improve every aspect of the school culture and environment.

How can schools use the WSCC model?

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Establishing healthy behaviors during childhood is easier and more effective than trying to change unhealthy behaviors during adulthood. Schools play a critical role in promoting the health and safety of young people and helping them establish lifelong healthy behaviors. Every school has a unique set of needs. To better serve their students, school leaders and staff can incorporate the WSCC model components as they see fit. 

To see the WSCC model in action, visit the Virtual Healthy School.

Meet Principal Paul, of the Jefferson School, and tour the virtual campus. Use the school map to learn how we’ve made this virtual school a healthier place for students and staff.

  • Click on any of the doors in the school map or the community map to view different scenes and classrooms.
  • Hover over the objects or characters in the scene or titles on the notepad to see examples of how to improve school health.
  • Access detailed “How to Use” instructions at any point by clicking on the Principal Paul chat head on the top right of your screen.
Have fun exploring!

Resources by WSCC Component


School Wellness Resources

​The Oregon Smart Snacks Standards, or other nutrition standards set by the district, should extend to all foods offered on the school campus including celebrations, rewards, and snacks.

Classroom Celebrations & Rewards
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Good nutrition and the ability to learn are intrinsically linked. Providing access to healthy foods at school - through foods offered or sold during the school day - not only supports students’ nutrition and develops lifelong eating habits, but also reinforces the nutrition education they receive in class.

Most schools engage in four to five fundraisers per year. School fundraisers can promote student, family, and community involvement and activity, part that promotes family and community involvement. Healthy fundraisers can be fun while keeping in step with health messages that students are learning in school. Below are a list of resources that include healthy fundraising ideas.

​Local Wellness Policies
Local Wellness Policies are an important vehicle for enhancing and sustaining school wellness efforts. Each local educational agency that participates in the National School Lunch Program or other federal Child Nutrition programs is required by federal law to establish a local school wellness policy for all schools under its jurisdiction.

We encourage you to view this Ted Talk by Sam Kass, this video describes the intent behind school wellness policies.

Engage school staff and parents in school wellness using these ready-to-go communication tools. Sharing news about your local school wellness policy is easy with these flyers, presentations, newsletter articles, and social media posts. Your school can personalize them to make them specific to your local school wellness policy activities.

Wellness Policy Resources
    To request a copy of the newest model local wellness policy, please contact staff at the Oregon School Boards Association policy services department or call 800-578-6722 or 503-588-2800 
    Triennial Assessment Tools

    Physical activity during the school day helps students concentrate, pay attention, and improve classroom behavior. Schools, where most of the students engage in physical activity every week, show bigger gains in test scores than other schools. Comprehensive physical activity programs include physical education and before, during, and afterschool opportunities for students to be physically active.

    This section contains information relevant to those working in organizations that support school health efforts. 

    Oregon Healthy Schools 

    Schools and communities working together for healthy, successful students and staff speaking 

     Healthy Schools CDC  

    ​​School Nutrition Environment. Childhood Nutrition Facts. Obesity Prevention. Youth Obesity Maps (2003-2015) Physical Activity. Youth Physical Activity Guidelines. Chronic Conditions. Asthma. Local School Wellness Policy. Whole School, Whole Community, Whole Child (WSCC) Virtual Healthy School, and more. 

    School Physical Activity & Nutrition Environment Tool (SPAN-ET) 

    The School Physical Activity and Nutrition Environment Tool (SPAN-ET) was developed to assess school resources and readiness to improve nutrition and physical activity environments suggest appropriate improvement strategies, and score impacts resulting from environmentally-based treatments 

    Place Matters Oregon 

    Place Matters Oregon is an effort of the Oregon Health Authority, Public Health Division that seeks to foster conversations about how place influences our individual and collective health 


    CDC Healthy School Resources​
    Fostering the physical and mental health of school employees also helps to support students’ health and academic success. Every school employee, no matter the role they play, contributes to a school’s mission. School staff can give their best when they feel their best. School employee wellness programs can help.

    Schools can provide an employee wellness program for staff that includes healthy eating and physical activity services. When staff model these healthy behaviors, they can reinforce them with students.

    Additionally, supporting school employee wellness programs can

    • Improve staff retention and productivity.
    • Decrease employee absenteeism.
    • Decrease employee health care costs.

    The organizations listed below help support school wellness through grant funding and technical assistance. 

    OEA Choice Trust 
    The mission of OEA Choice Trust is to provide expertise and resources to help Oregon public school employees create comprehensive and flexible wellness programs to build a culture of wellness that becomes the norm in school workplaces. This page provides grant opportunities and awards to help schools to support this school employee wellness. 

    Action for Healthy Kids 
    Schools need resources to implement health and wellness practices that help students eat better and be physically active. Thanks to our partners, Action for Healthy Kids has provided $6.6 million in grants to schools since 2009. Our School Grants for Healthy Kids can help your school health team achieve its goal of making every kid healthy and ready to learn. 

    Oregon Child Nutrition Programs 
    This page is dedicated to assisting sponsors with grant opportunities for their school nutrition programs. 

    The word data essentially means information. Data provides information to on how well interventions work. Gathering data over time or from different sources allows you to see patterns, gaps, and determine where to put your efforts. Data collection should occur at the local (school and district) level. Include school and district-level data into grant applications. The sites listed below will provide a balcony view of the data – providing information at the state and national level. Data visualization helps the user effectively communicate data analysis to others. 

    Nutrition, Physical Activity, and Weight
    Data visualization 
    Oregon Specific Data
    • Oregon Healthy Teens (OHT) is Oregon's effort to monitor the health and well-being of adolescents. An anonymous and voluntary research-based survey, OHT is conducted among 8th and 11th graders statewide. The OHT survey incorporates two youth surveys that preceded it, the YRBS and the Student Drug Use Survey. (OHT) is Oregon's effort to monitor the health and well-being of adolescents. An anonymous and voluntary research-based survey, OHT is conducted among 8th and 11th graders statewide. The OHT survey incorporates two youth surveys that preceded it, the YRBS and the Student Drug Use Survey. 
    •  Student Health Survey Results 
    Food Insecurity Data

    Community Connections


    CDC Parents for Healthy Schools

    Español (Spanish)

    Parents have a powerful role in supporting their children’s health and learning. Engaged parents help guide their children successfully through school, advocate for their children, and can help shape a healthy school environment.

    CDC developed a set of resources, called Parents for Healthy Schools, to assist schools, school groups, and school wellness committees with encouraging parent involvement in school health. Parents for Healthy Schools uses evidence-based strategies for parent engagement.

    Parent Engagement in Schools
    Parent engagement in schools is parents and school staff working together to support and improve the learning, development, and health of children and adolescents.

    Parent engagement in schools is an important, shared responsibility in which schools and other community agencies and organizations are committed to getting parents involved in meaningful ways, and parents are committed to actively supporting their children’s and adolescents’ learning and development.

    When parents are engaged in their children’s school activities, their children get better grades, choose healthier behaviors, and have better social skills. In addition, school health activities are more successful when parents are involved.

    Parents for Healthy Schools resources gives school staff, parents, and school groups, like parent-teacher associations (PTA) and parent-teacher organizations (PTO), ideas and strategies for working together to create a healthier school.
    Parents for Healthy Schools Framework
    Parent Engagement Strategies Parent Engagement Facilitator Guide
    Drawing from research and best practices from schools across the country, CDC collaborated with key partners to create the strategies found in Parents for Healthy Schools to give schools a framework for parent engagement. There are three aspects of the parent engagement framework:
    1. Connecting with parents.
    2. Engaging parents in school health activities.
    3. Sustaining parent engagement in school health.
    CDC’s Parent Engagement: Strategies for Involving Parents in School Health  defines and describes engagement between parents and school staff and identifies specific strategies for all three aspects of parent engagement in schools: connect, engage, and sustain.

    CDC’s Promoting Parent Engagement in School Health: A Facilitator’s Guide for Staff Development helps schools and school groups develop a plan for engaging parents in school health activities. Both of these resources provide the evidence-based framework for Parents for Healthy Schools.

    CDC’s Parent Engagement: Strategies for Involving Parents in School Health

    CDC’s Promoting Parent Engagement in School Health 

    Get more Parents for Healthy Schools resources here.


    We are here to help! Contact us for assistance with your school wellness questions.​

    Jennifer Young, MPH, EdD, RDN

    School Wellness Policy Coordinator

    Email: Jennifer.l.Young@ode.oregon.gov

    Phone: 503-508-7940