CDC Features
Creating Asthma-Friendly Schools
The toolkit includes science-based suggestions and tools for making schools more asthma-friendly.
Asthma is a leading chronic illness among young people in the United States. More than 5 million school-aged children and adolescents have asthma and more than 3 million had an asthma episode or attack within the previous year. On average, 3 children in a classroom of 30 are likely to have asthma.
Although asthma is an issue affecting all schools across the United States, many school and community members do not understand its impact and what they can do to support students with asthma in participating fully in all school activities.
The mission of the asthma program at CDC's Division of Adolescent and School Health is to increase the number of asthma-friendly schools across the United States. Asthma-friendly schools adopt policies and procedures and coordinate student services to better serve students with asthma.
To support schools and communities in creating asthma-friendly schools, CDC's Division of Adolescent and School Health just released Initiating Change: Creating an Asthma-Friendly School, a toolkit developed to help advocates at the district and school levels persuade people in their schools and communities of the importance of asthma-friendly schools. The cornerstone of the toolkit is a 13-minute, inspirational video on Creating an Asthma-Friendly School, which features real-life success stories of students who, thanks to their schools' asthma-friendly policies and programs, now have their asthma under control. The toolkit also includes materials to help people plan and facilitate a showing of the video in their community or school, as well as science-based suggestions and tools for making their schools more asthma-friendly.
Order free copies of the video or toolkit by calling 1-800-CDC-INFO (800-232-4636).
The 13-minute video features real-life stories of students who, thanks to their schools’ asthma-friendly policies and programs, now have their asthma under control.
For More Information
• Creating an Asthma-Friendly School
• View a podcast (
13:44 mins)
• View a free webinar* on using the video and toolkit
to market asthma-friendly schools ()
• Healthy Youth! Healthy Topics: Asthma
Page last updated: June 6, 2008
Content source: National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion, Division of Adolescent and School Health, Research Application Branch
Content owner: National Center for Health Marketing
URL for this page: www.cdc.gov/Features/SchoolAsthma/
*Links to non-federal organizations are provided solely as a service to our users. These links do not constitute an endorsement of these organizations or their programs by CDC or the federal government, and none should be inferred. CDC is not responsible for the content of the individual organization Web pages found at these links.
