Healthy Teens : Success in High School and Beyond

This easy-to-read guide for families of teens covers crucial issues kids face today. The book emphasizes the connection between healthy lifestyles and family involvement, and the success of teens in school and in life. Healthy Teens offers common sense advice for parents and professionals working with teens.

Alice R. McCarthy, Ph.D., is a nationally known civic leader, educator, and writer. She is a Cornell University graduate in early childhood development and education, and she completed her doctorate at Wayne State University (WSU) in 1986. Her work at WSU concerned human growth over the life span and curriculum development. Since her degree work, Dr. McCarthy has devoted her energies to family education, research, and curriculum writing related to health and the family.

Currently, Dr. McCarthy is involved in several health education projects related to children and families. She is writing a curriculum for families, Parents as Partners: Keeping Kids Healthy, based on nationally distributed health curricula. She is also preparing a national curriculum in health for students in grades kindergarten through six, entitled, Health 'n Me! Her book, Healthy Teens: Success in High School and Beyond, was published in September, 1996, with the support of the school health programs of the State of Michigan's Departments of Community Health, Education, State Police, and the Family Independence Agency. Healthy Teens was immediately sold out in its first printing. A second edition is in print. Dr. McCarthy has conducted several research projects, all of which have been devoted to the health education needs of families.

Since 1992, Dr. McCarthy's company, Bridge Communications, Inc., has been publishing three different four-color, four-page health newsletters for families. Healthy Beginnings is for families with children in pre-kindergarten through grade 3; Healthy Growing is for grades 4-5; and Healthy Choices is for grades 6-8. These newsletters are published twice each school year, and are purchased mainly by intermediate districts. The Healthy newsletters, which reach between 550,000 and 600,000 families each issue, have received many national and state awards.

In 1994 and 1995, Dr. McCarthy published Healthy Preschoolers: At School-At Home to help parents teach their preschoolers about health and safety issues. This book for families was developed with the guidance of professionals at the Michigan Department of Education, the Michigan Department of Public Health, and Children's Hospital of Michigan.

Dr. McCarthy has been the executive editor of a number of manuals and magazines for families related to child development, family issues, and health. In 1991 and 1992, Dr. McCarthy was the executive editor of Good For You!, a 48-page, four-color health information magazine developed with a federal grant designed to expand family involvement in the Michigan Model for Comprehensive School Health Education. In 1993, her company, Bridge Communications, Inc., published a four-color magazine entitled, Healthy Families and Healthy Children, for Growing Healthy(r), a national health education program taught in Oakland County, Michigan. These two magazines reached nearly one million parents in Michigan and across the United States.

Between 1987 and 1994, Dr. McCarthy prepared a column -"The Advisory Board-for the Parent Talk" page of The Detroit Free Press. She currently prepares "All About Families", a column for the Suburban Communications Corporation that features professionals who answer family questions.

Dr. McCarthy began her advocacy for health education over twenty years ago by initiating a health education curriculum in the school system her five children attended. Her civic roles are extensive. She is the past chairperson of the Board of Regents of Lake Superior State University in Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan, and past Chairperson of the Board of Directors of The Merrill-Palmer Institute, Wayne State University. She has been honored nationally and state-wide with many awards and commendations.