Every school should have its own school nurse, based on site, to help tackle child obesity, nutritional problems and teenage pregnancy, according to new research from the Fabian Society.
The Fabian Society argues that primary and secondary schools need increased numbers of specially trained nurses. Pupils should be able to turn to on-site nurses for medical advice and the nurse should be a recognised member of the school team.
The Fabian report, Born Unequal, to be published on March 28, argues that existing school nurses have too many schools to cover, and are not on site every week, and therefore are unable to build up a rapport with pupils.
It argues that school nurses are best placed to address health and sex education issues, and better equipped to teach sex education than teachers, who often spend as little as two hours in their PGCE training learning how to take a sex education class, a subject that is considered difficult to teach by many. As one lecturer in education told the report's authors: "There is rarely room in these extremely crowded PGCE programmes for more than one session." Another advantage for pupils would be nurses' background and medical training.
Teenagers interviewed for the report said that they would rather have the subject handled by someone other than a teacher, and they would feel more comfortable dealing with someone with a medical background.
Louise Bamfield, senior research fellow at the Fabian Society, said: "This is a long way from the days of nit nurses. We are calling for a taskforce of specially trained school nurses who would become a vital part of the education and health strategy to improve teenagers' health, and be on site in schools as soon as possible. Specially trained school nurses will be able to help improve the diet of teenagers, and particularly pregnant teenagers, who research shows have a worse diet than any other group of mothers-to-be."