Parents
Health insurance, including medical, dental, and vision care insurance, is a key step to ensuring the health of a child. Without health insurance it is difficult for the child to receive preventative care and to receive necessary medical treatments or to fill drug prescriptions should the child become sick. There are many different low or no cost health insurance programs for both working and non-working families. Many eligible children and their families do not even know these programs exist. You can learn more about these programs and if your child might be eligible for no or low cost health insurance.
If you would like find out about enrolling your child in health insurance, please call 1-800-880-5305, or visit the Health Families website to learn more about the application processes for both Healthy Families and Medi-Cal.
Additionally, parents are one of the most important school district community members. If you think your district has a need for a health coverage outreach project, you can be a great facilitator of the process. Below is a description of the typical project.
Once a district is identified, which can be by someone within the district, a health plan partner, community member, or THK, THK will meet with district and teacher association (where possible) staff to go over the importance of health insurance for students and the steps to the project. If the project is approved, schools are identified and the outreach process begins. The following are the steps to the project:
- Each health plan is assigned to an equal number of schools of relatively equal size within the district (e.g. each health plan is assigned to two middle schools and one elementary school).
- The health plan partners meet with their assigned schools to discuss the program with the principal or other identified school staff, such as a school nurse or health coordinator. During this meeting, the health plan partner arranges a time to do a presentation at a regularly scheduled teachers’ meeting.
- The health plan partner, often with the school nurse or a district health staff member, gives a presentation to teachers explaining the importance of health insurance, describing the program, and providing the teachers with materials.
- Each teacher receives a teacher bag and envelope with a class set of surveys. See an example of our surveys.
- Teachers are shown the incentives students will receive if they return their surveys: stickers for students grades K through 3rd and calculators for students grades 4th through 6th. Middle school and high school students may be entered in a raffle to receive an appropriate prize, if the school approves.
- Teachers are also informed that the class with the highest rate of return will receive a sandwich party (or similar) and/or the teacher will receive a gift certificate to an office supply store.
- The teachers are asked to pass out the surveys to their students and collect them and place them in their original envelope within 10 days.
- The teacher sends the collected surveys to the school’s office where they are picked up by the health plan partner.
- The health plan partner provides the school and teachers with the incentives.
- The health plan partner or a community based organization calls and enrolls all interested children and families in no or low cost health insurance. If there are large numbers of interested families and the school approves, an enrollment event may be held at the school for the interested parents.
- The results of the project are reported back to the school and THK. THK will compile the results from all the schools and report the information to the district.
To see all the incentives and materials provided to teachers and schools, click here.
There are many ways in which this program can be modified to meet the needs of the schools from arranging enrollment events to foregoing teacher presentations to altering incentives. However, over the years of implementing health outreach projects, this has been the most effective way to promote the enrollment of children and their families in no or low cost health insurance.
Health plan partners are encouraged to continue their relationships with their assigned schools beyond the first outreach project. The partners are encouraged to attend back to school nights, open houses, health fairs, and to collect surveys throughout the year by working with the school office staff so new students entering the school and current students losing their insurance can be enrolled.
Additionally, as the project continues, if the health plan partners have trouble making contact in schools or identify a school in which they are interested in working, THK will establish contact with the school and help develop a relationship.
If you would like to get involved with our outreach projects, please contact us.