School nurses play an integral role in helping students maintain physical and mental wellbeing during their schooling years and beyond. For children in most communities, school nurses serve as the only healthcare professional the child will ever know. This is evidence of the importance of their role with respect to student and community health, providing comprehensive health services to children and youth.  

So, how does a school nurse benefit the school? 

1. Improves attendance rates in schools: School nurses play an essential role in helping students stay healthy in schools. School nurses provide for the emotional and physical safety of school students by taking care of immunizations, ensuring proper diagnosis of infectious diseases and reporting school heatlh statuses to health services as required by the law. This healthy environment results in a lesser number of children falling ill and higher turn up rates at schools.  

2. Helps improve academic performance: School nurses help improve students’ attendance rates which invariably improves academic performance. By playing a key role in maintaining a physically and emotionally safe environment for students’, school nurses help children feel safe in their schools which dispels their fears lets them concentrate on learning leading to improved academic performance. 

3. Saving the time of teachers and principals by addressing the health concerns of students: How children’s health concerns are addressed in an environment supported by a school nurse is very different when compared with a setting without a school nurse. Without a school nurse, teachers, help staff or a member in the school administration would have to take care of these concerns, which would take up much of their time given that they are not professionally trained to handle such a situation. In such cases, having a school nurse benefits the school. A school nurse would be able to quickly address the concern and help others save their time.  

4. Takes care of staff’s health: Teachers’ health is an important aspect in a healthy educational setting. School nurses can help take care of teachers’ health as well ensuring immediate medical assistance when they fall ill and so that they can recover faster and return to their daily classes. 

5. Help school’s administration stay compliant: School nurses let school administration stay compliant with regulatory requirements laid down by federal and state health organizations. Apart from that, school nurses also can guide school administration on the importance of adequate staffing as well as lay the groundwork for setting up a strong healthcare framework that’s in the best interest of the school, children, teachers and the administration. 

After the child’s home, schools represent the second most influential environment in a child’s life. And the school nurse is the healthcare representative on the site. An understanding of a school nurse’s role is important in understanding the many benefits of having them in a schooling environment. School nurses help children learn about health, identify health risks and illnesses, address physical and emotional issues, administer medications safely, verify immunizations and more.  School nurses provide leadership for the provision of health services and beyond in a school setting helping keep the community a healthy and safe place for children.