Abstract:

Why is it important to address the environmental health competences that our young students acquire? Mainly for two reasons:
1) The environment is a health determinant. Changes in the state of our environment pose significant implications on our health, many of them negative, such as respiratory diseases, neurodevelopmental disorders, cancer, etc. It is imperative that citizens, as modifying agents of the environment, become aware of the important implications of environmental degradation on our health –included in the concept of environmental health- as an essential prerequisite to the implementation of solutions to environmental health problems.
2) The current educational proposals are established in a competence-based formative approach. Addressing environmental health competences from the educational sphere enables resource mobilization to address the existing and emerging environmental health problems of today's society.

What have we done to approach this view of young people? Students from three public secondary schools in Valencia were asked to answer a questionnaire including different open questions related to environmental health. The first question focused on the concept of health, the second on the relationships they were able to establish between health and the environment and, finally, the questionnaire focused on five open questions corresponding to the three sub-competences that define the environmental health competence (the student knows the problem, knows what to do to deal with it and is able to express an opinion or show a predisposition for action). A total of 176 students from different educational levels answered the questionnaire, comprising students in their last year of Primary Education -6th grade- and the last year -4th grade- of Compulsory Secondary Education, and considering different variables as gender and area of origin (rural and urban areas). A qualitative and quantitative analysis of the responses was made, carrying out likewise a comparison of the different variables of the Valencian students considered.

What environmental health competences have acquired Valencian students on their way through compulsory education? In a first approximation, we conclude that the interviewed students are still far from establishing complete relationships between health and the environment. Environment is not included in their concept of health and they are not capable of specifying environmental health problems. Nevertheless, the improvement throughout the education system is remarkable, with a great progress throughout the education system since: only about 17% of the students who have completed Primary Education have proved competency in environmental health, while 50% of the students who have completed Secondary Education have acquired that competence. These data of the progressive acquisition of environmental health competences as educational level rises support the argument of the need to complete compulsory education. Furthermore, different results have been obtained regarding other variables analysed: it seems that students from rural areas are more capable to face environmental health problems than those from urban areas while no significant differences have been found in the responses when comparing gender.

Keywords:

Environmental health, compulsory education, competences.