| Although school health education is now seen as a national priority (U.S. Public Health service, 1990), an adequate description of those teachers responsible for delivering school health education has not been found. The intent of this investigation is to provide baseline data concerning secondary health educators in Texas which, in turn, can be used to compare with data from other states.;Subjects in this study were randomly selected from a database of all secondary health education teachers in Texas provided by the Texas Education Agency. A total of 205 questionnaires was collected resulting in an overall response rate of 74%.;Just over 60% of secondary health educators in Texas are male. Eighty-four percent were Caucasian. The average age was just under 40 years. The average teacher has taught for 14 years, less than ten of those years in health education. Most (80% of males and 40% of females) have had coaching responsibilities in the past five years and many belong to professional coaching organizations. Each respondent had an average of three hours of additional non-teaching duty per week, five hours of preparation time per week, and an average of 21 students in their classes.;Although all had a degree in some field, less than 50% had a degree in health education and 30% did not have a certification in health education. Ten percent had no academic background in health education at all. Those with no background in health education showed significantly less confidence and competence in their teaching ability than those with some level of background in health education. Of all subunits in health education, participants felt most confident teaching Safety and First Aid and least confident teaching Environmental Health.;Almost all felt that health education was as important as other courses, but just over 50% felt their administration shared that view. Less than 36% felt their fellow faculty members viewed health education as important as other courses.;Respondents felt that the Prevention of Drug Use was the most important topic in health education and Consumer Health was the least important. Overall, health educators felt that their textbook and support materials were the most severe obstacle to their functioning effectively. |
