Case studies offer concrete examples and success stories of how librarians and educators have used Teen Health & Wellness to support teens both in libraries and classrooms.

Read the case studies below to:

• See how our public library partners like Brooklyn (NY) and Schaumburg (IL) use Teen Health & Wellness to support their goal of creating healthy communities.
• Learn how public school districts like San Diego (CA) and Appleton (WI) were able to stretch their budgets to offer safe, credible, and authoritative information and self-help support to their students.
• Hear from students in Naperville (IL) Central High School, who found the information in Teen Health & Wellness helpful, easily accessible, and said they would use the resource again.

Complete case studies here:
Appleton (WI) School District
Brooklyn (NY) Public Library
Nashville (TN) Limitless Libraries
San Diego (CA) School District
Schaumburg (IL) Public Library
St. Joseph (MO) School District

You can add your own local resources to the customizable Hotlines page on Teen Health & Wellness.

Your local resources will appear on the Hotlines page for all users who log into the database via your library. The local content appears below the box with emergency and 911 information and above the resources provided by Teen Health & Wellness. You can also turn off the resources provided by Teen Health & Wellness so that only your local resources will appear.

To customize your hotlines, log in with your administrative username and password. Once logged in, click the link near the bottom of the left column to “update hotline information.”

If you need your administrative username/password or have questions, please contact customer service via email or phone at (800) 237-9932.

Teachers can use Teen Health & Wellness lesson plans to support their programs on health, science, physical education, and language arts. Integrate the database into your classroom and motivate students to learn. All entries are correlated to state, national, and provincial curriculum standards.

• Birth Control/Contraception: Students can research a method of contraception to prepare and present an eight-slide PowerPoint on the topic.
• Body Systems: Students can research a body system and then create an oral presentation, written presentation, and Wiki on that system.
• Budgeting and Money Management: Students can create a sample monthly budget that includes their income, fixed costs, discretionary spending, and more.
• Driver Education: Students can research a topic related to driver education to reflect upon, and then write a paper summarizing the article and their personal reflections.
• Editing and Writing for Publication: By participating in our Personal Story Project, students can learn how to write and edit material for publication, based on specific submission requirements. They can then submit their essays to Teen Health & Wellness for publication on our site and receive a certificate of achievement if their story is accepted for publication.
• Fad Diets: Students can research a fad diet along with principles of general nutrition to create a PowerPoint presentation with a minimum of ten slides.
• Financial Literacy: A five-day lesson plan that covers the basics of budgeting and money management; budgeting at home, school, and work; and financial myths and facts.
• Health and Wellness: Students can research a health/wellness topic of your choice and then use their material to create a brochure for a doctor's office.
• Hotlines and Resources for Teens: Students can research hotlines and resources to support teens in crisis on a topic of their choosing and then create a poster to hang in the school library or hallway.
• It’s Your Voice PSA: Students can create a PSA that gives information, provides a solution, or brings awareness to a social issue faced by teens. They can then submit their PSAs to Teen Health and Wellness for publication on our site. Created by Ruth Thoreson, Information Literacy Specialist/Teacher Librarian at Johnston High School; Johnston, Iowa.
• Sample Lesson Plan: Sexual Health (Illinois State Standards): This comprehensive, five-day lesson plan covers puberty, the male and female reproductive systems, reproduction and pregnancy, and making smart sexual choices for students in grades 9 through 12.

From gaming to teen cuisine to online safety, these proven Program Ideas can help you introduce your teen patrons to Teen Health & Wellness and better integrate the database into your teen programming.

Download the PowerPoint Beyond the Basics: Tips to Maximize Usage and share with your colleagues. This presentation is filled with usage ideas and suggestions to integrate Teen Health & Wellness into your library or classroom.

Choose from a variety of promotional tools to help you connect your colleagues and teen users to Teen Health & Wellness. Simply click a file below to download it.

• Bookmarks:
  • “You are not alone. Share your voice.” (PDF)
  • “From Dating to Dyslexia” (PDF)
  • “From Bullying to Body Art” (PDF)
  • “Visit the Calm Room” (PDF)
  • Let us customize your bookmarks with your URL and school or library name.
• Posters:
  • “Visit the Calm Room” (11 x 17, PDF)
  • “Got Questions? Get Answers.” (PDF)
  • “Got Questions? Get Answers.” Spanish Version (PDF)
  • “From Dating to Dyslexia” (11 x 17, PDF)
  • “From Bullying to Body Art” (11 x 17, PDF)
  • Let us customize your posters with your URL and school or library name.


• Meet Teen Social & Emotional Needs flyer (PDF)
• Visit the Calm Room flyer (PDF)
• Beyond the Basics (PowerPoint) — A collection of quick tips to make integrating Teen Health & Wellness into your library or classroom easy.
• Counselor Letter (PDF) — Highlights content and features that are of specific interest to school counselors.
• List of database entries (PDF) — View a full list of all entries, organized by subject.
• THW Tips and Tools flyer (PDF) — This one-page flyer shares the basics of getting started with Teen Health & Wellness as well as tips and tools to maximize use.
• Web Buttons — Promote the database on your library Web site or Facebook page.

Teen Health & Wellness has partnered with Scientific American magazine to offer reviewed content about important research, health, technology, science, the environment, and society. Scientific American is the oldest continuously published magazine in the United States and continues to be a trusted source for the latest information and happenings in science around the world. Scientific American magazine articles have been reviewed and selected by Rosen’s team of editors and added to appropriate sections. These high-interest articles provide additional and unique content to further support health and science inquiry and instruction.

Visit the Scientific American: Resource Articles archive to review and select the added content for individual, group, or classroom instruction.

Download a royalty free music track for your video PSA. Be sure to read the rules and guidelines before submitting your video. You can browse other examples of student videos in the video gallery.

Song Title	Genre	Duration	Credit	Download
Across Town	Electronica/Urban	1:18	Across Town/Harry Woodum/Soundzabound Royalty Free Music, www.soundzabound.com.
All That Remains	Ambient	3:38	All That Remains/Gary Arnold/Soundzabound Royalty Free Music, www.soundzabound.com.
Avalanche	Electronica	1:08	Avalanche/Arkadii Kaplan/Soundzabound Royalty Free Music, www.soundzabound.com.
Broken Hearted	Pop/Soft Rock	2:58	Broken Hearted/Gary Arnold/Soundzabound Royalty Free Music, www.soundzabound.com.
Bukan Salah Keadaan	World/Folk	3:40	Bukan Salah Keadaan/Inframe Project/Soundzabound Royalty Free Music, www.soundzabound.com.
Cool Summer	Electronica	3:44	Cool Summer/Atarilogic/Soundzabound Royalty Free Music, www.soundzabound.com.
Dark Times	Electronica/Rock	4:09	Dark Times/Martin Voglino Project/Soundzabound Royalty Free Music, www.soundzabound.com.
Die Ablenhung	Classical/Electronica	3:44	Die Ablenhung/Havok/Soundzabound Royalty Free Music, www.soundzabound.com.
Dirty Jeans	Pop/Soft Rock	1:45	Dirty Jeans/Gary Arnold//Soundzabound Royalty Free Music, www.soundzabound.com.
Dream	Ambient/Electronica	3:10	Dream/Claire Baum/Soundzabound Royalty Free Music, www.soundzabound.com.
Ethereal	Ambient/Electronica	4:16	Ethereal/Gary Arnold/Soundzabound Royalty Free Music, www.soundzabound.com.
Fairground	Pop/Soft Rock	3:20	Fairground/Indie Go Blue/Soundzabound Royalty Free Music, www.soundzabound.com.
Funky Kitchen	Pop/Soft Rock	1:55	Funky Kitchen/Gary Arnold//Soundzabound Royalty Free Music, www.soundzabound.com.
Goodbye California	Pop/Folk	4:13	Goodbye California/Frankly Speaking/Soundzabound Royalty Free Music, www.soundzabound.com.
Kill Zone	Ambient/Electronica	1:32	Kill Zone/Gary Arnold/Soundzabound Royalty Free Music, www.soundzabound.com.
Looking Back	Pop/Soft Rock	2:44	Looking Back/Gary Arnold/Soundzabound Royalty Free Music, www.soundzabound.com.
Metalhearts	Electronica/Urban	2:46	Metalhearts/Atarilogic/Soundzabound Royalty Free Music, www.soundzabound.com.
Missing Pieces	Electronica/Rock	2:22	Missing Pieces/Gary Arnold/Soundzabound Royalty Free Music, www.soundzabound.com.
Nameless	Ambient/Electronica	3:06	Nameless/Claire Baum/Soundzabound Royalty Free Music, www.soundzabound.com.
Passing Over	Ambient/Electronica	3:06	Passing Over/Gary Arnold/Soundzabound Royalty Free Music, www.soundzabound.com.
Pink Garbage	Pop/Soft Rock	3:47	Pink Garbage/Gary Arnold/Soundzabound Royalty Free Music, www.soundzabound.com.
Teen Dream	Pop/Soft Rock	2:30	Teen Dream/Gary Arnold/Soundzabound Royalty Free Music, www.soundzabound.com.
The Strategy	Classical/Electronica	1:45	The Strategy/Gary Arnold/Soundzabound Royalty Free Music, www.soundzabound.com.
The Summit	Electronica/Urban	7:10	The Summit/Ultraphonics/Soundzabound Royalty Free Music, www.soundzabound.com.
Valley of Kings	Rock	3:25	Valley of Kings/Gary Arnold/Soundzabound Royalty Free Music, www.soundzabound.com.
Walking Away	Pop/Soft Rock	2:22	Walking Away/Gary Arnold/Soundzabound Royalty Free Music, www.soundzabound.com.

To download any of the below materials, right-click the link and select Save As.

• THW Tips and Tools flyer: This one-page flyer has everything you need to get started with your subscription including: logging in, checking usage statistics, tips on integrating the database into your library or classroom, promoting it to your teens, and more.
• THW Tutorial: An in-depth review of the database features, functionality, and content.
• Educator How-To’s: Ruth Kuzmanic—a HS health educator for over 30 years in Naperville, IL, technology guru, and longtime customer—provides a quick, approachable tutorial on THW and how to get your students hands-on with it.
• Beyond the Basics: Tips to Maximize Usage: A collection of ideas and suggestions to make integrating Teen Health & Wellness into your library or classroom easy.
• User’s Guide: A comprehensive overview of the database features and functionality as well as helpful tips for using the database most effectively. Feel free to download and distribute to your colleagues and teen users via print or email.

Log in to view your account information and usage statistics.

You will need your administrative username and password to access this area of Teen Health & Wellness. If you need assistance, please contact customer service via email or phone at 1-877-381-6649.

The Teen Health & Wellness User’s Guide can help you make the most of your subscription. It offers a comprehensive overview of the database features and functionality, as well as helpful tips for using the database most effectively.

You can download the User’s Guide and share it with your colleagues or teen users via print or email.

Get the most out of Teen Health & Wellness by making sure your teens know where to find trusted, credible health information 24/7. Promote Teen Health & Wellness on your library Web site with Web buttons that link directly to the Teen Health & Wellness homepage.

Buttons are available in two colors and three sizes. (See examples.) Right click on the links below to download a button:

• 100 x 75: blue, orange (.png)
• 150 x 75: blue, orange (.png)
• 200 x 200: blue, orange (.png)

Widgets

Our handy search widget lets users search the contents of Teen Health & Wellness from anywhere on your site. Simply copy and paste the search widget code onto your site, or ask your Web administrator for help.

Check out the latest additions to Teen Health & Wellness!

Scientific American: Resource Articles

Teen Health & Wellness has partnered with Scientific American magazine to offer reviewed content about important research, health, technology, science, the environment, and society. These high-interest articles have been reviewed and selected by Rosen’s team of editors and provide additional and unique content regarding Teen Health & Wellness topics to further support health and science inquiry and instruction.

Accessibility Features

Teen Health & Wellness has added AccessiBe, an accessibility tool that helps make our site friendlier for users with disabilities. Users can adjust AccessiBe’s settings to clear flashes, enhance visuals, reduce distractions, increase focus, and optimize for screen readers, among other features. For users with screen readers, the tool is enabled automatically. AccessiBe aims to adhere as strictly as possible to the World Wide Web Consortium’s (W3C) Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 2.1 (WCAG 2.1) at the AA level. You can check all the features by clicking on the icon in the lower right corner of the screen on any page. From there, you can explore all the tools that are available.

New Articles

• Social Media Anxiety addresses information overload, FOMO (fear of missing out), self-esteem, and other mental health consequences of excessive use of social media.

 

Notable Article Updates

• We’ve updated our article on Ovarian Cancer to bring the news that in October 2024, researchers at the University of Oxford secured funding to create the world’s first vaccine designed to prevent ovarian cancer. Ovarian cancer is the fifth leading cause of cancer death among females in the United States, so this is big news. If their research proves successful, the next step will be to initiate clinical trials. The ultimate goal is to offer women a vaccine that could help prevent ovarian cancer before it occurs.


• Dyslexia and its related disabilities are far more common than many people assume. The International Dyslexia Association estimates that in 2024, one in five students, or 15–20 percent of the population, has a language-based learning disability. We’ve updated our article on Dyslexia, Dysgraphia and Dyscalculia to highlight the often undetected nature of this disability, and we feature seven different personal stories from students facing the challenges that come with it.


• One person died and twenty-seven people were hospitalized during an E. coli outbreak in October, linked to fresh onions served on McDonald’s Quarter Pounders and other items. We don’t update our E. Coli article with every new development in this or other outbreaks of the foodborne illness, but our article does post a link to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)’s own list of outbreaks.


• Young people are getting wise to the dangers of tobacco. As we note in our article on Tobacco and Nicotine, teen smoking and the use of other tobacco products in the U.S. have dropped to the lowest levels seen in 25 years, according to an October report from the CDC. The report highlights a 20 percent decrease in tobacco use among middle and high school students from 2023 to 2024. This includes traditional cigarettes, e-cigarettes, nicotine pouches, and hookahs. The number of youth using at least one tobacco product fell from 2.8 million to 2.25 million, marking a significant decline.


• Even if you don’t know what “nomophobia” is, you’ve likely felt it. It’s short for “no-mobile-phone phobia”—the anxiety people get when they are away from their phone, lose their phone, lose cell coverage, or run out of battery life. Psychologists consider it a real anxiety disorder that can make it harder for people to disconnect from their over-stimulating digital lives. This fall, the U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy called for warning labels to be added to social media apps to inform users about the risks of excessive social media use, similar to health warnings on cigarettes and alcohol. We’ve updated our article on Social Media Anxiety to reflect this latest news.


• Hurricane Helene is just the latest natural disaster to take hundreds of people’s lives and disrupt thousands of others. Our Natural Disasters article not only adds Helene to our ever-growing list of hurricanes, tornadoes, blizzards, tsunamis, and other traumatic events, but gives young people advice on preparedness, evacuation plans, and coping skills when disaster strikes, as well as resources they can contact to help them through a crisis.


• For some happy news, we’ve added Yale psychologist Dr. Laurie Santos’s The Happiness Lab podcast to our list of resources in our Self-Esteem and Confidence, Stress, Depression and Mood Disorders, and Mindfulness articles to remind young (and not-so-young) people how to be happy. The podcast is based on the psychology course she teaches at Yale—the most popular class in the university’s 300-year history—and takes you through the latest scientific research and share some surprising and inspiring stories that will change the way you think about happiness.


• With school back in session, teens’ stress levels can rise and their sleep habits decline. As we note in our updated article on Sleep and Sleep Deprivation, teens already know about the importance of a good night’s sleep. In a 2024 survey conducted by the National Sleep Foundation, three-quarters of teens reported that their emotional well-being was negatively affected by a lack of sleep. By contrast, among teens who got a good night’s sleep, 80 percent of them reported being free of any significant depressive symptoms.


• We’ve updated our Behind the Wheel article to reflect the latest evidence that a good night’s sleep also has an effect on staying alive while driving. The same National Sleep Foundation survey estimated that more than 400,000 American teens drove drowsy at least once per week. According to the latest data from the National Highway Transportation and Safety Administration, drowsy driving was responsible for 693 deaths in 2022.


• High blood pressure (or hypertension) is often called ”the silent killer“ because it so easily goes undetected. High levels of sodium found in restaurant foods, packaged foods, and processed foods are among the primary causes of hypertension. We’ve updated our Blood Pressure article with the Food and Drug Administration’s latest guidance recommending that Americans reduce their sodium intake by 20 percent over a three-year period.


• Body mass index (BMI) has been a common metric for measuring obesity for decades, but a recent article in the medical journal JAMA Network Open introduced many readers to the concept of the ”body roundness index“ (BRI). Unlike BMI, which only uses height and weight, BRI also considers hip and waist measurements. The article states that this provides a more accurate estimate of total and visceral fat, the deep belly fat around organs that poses higher health risks. We’ve updated our Obesity article to reflect the new findings.


• Natural disasters are hard on everyone, but especially on young people who lack the resources or experience needed to protect themselves in such situations. July 2024’s Hurricane Beryl was just the latest in devastating weather-related disasters to strike North America. We keep our Natural Disasters article updated with the latest preparedness and emergency contact information to help inform teens on how to remain safe, and give advice on how to cope when disasters strike.


• The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) recently announced that it is banning the use of brominated vegetable oil (BVO) in food and drink products, which has primarily been used to stabilize citrus flavorings in sodas, sports drinks, and energy drinks. New research suggests that BVO can accumulate in organs and tissues at potentially harmful levels, and may be toxic to the thyroid. Our Sodas, Sports Drinks, and Bottled Water article covers the short- and long-term health effects of sodas and sports drinks.


• A new study published in the medical journal Pediatrics finds that there may be a connection between teens with hypertension (high blood pressure) and a lack of quality sleep. Dr. Amy Kogon, an assistant professor at the University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine, says health officials typically focus on diet and exercise but rarely consider how sleep might play a role in a teen’s cardiovascular health. As we note in our updated Sleep and Sleep Deprivation article, on a typical school night, just over 25 percent of high school students get eight or more hours of sleep.


• The summer of 2024 has seen record-breaking heat waves sweep across the western United States, and the average global temperatures between July 2023 and June 2024 were the highest on record, with Earth surpassing the 1.5° Celsius warming limit targeted by the 2016 Paris Climate Accords. As our article on Ecoanxiety notes, worries about the climate are increasingly a mental health challenge for many teens as they face an ever-warming planet.


• As noted in our Marijuana and our Marijuana and the Legalization Debate articles, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) recently announced that it is seeking to downgrade cannabis from its current classification as a Schedule I drug to a Schedule III controlled substance. This change, recommended by U.S. health regulators, would recognize the medical uses of cannabis and make it easier to conduct research on cannabis products, but wouldn’t legalize marijuana for recreational use at the federal level. It would also lessen or potentially do away with the criminal penalty for possession.


• We’ve added the American Heart Association’s Teen of Impact to the Resources page of our Emergency Lifesaving Techniques, Heart, and Living a Heart-Healthy Life articles. Teen of Impact highlights teens who have taken action to promote good heart health among teens. Sixteen-year-old Aniston Barnette of Bristol, Tennessee, is the 2024 National Teen of Impact Winner. Aniston got involved with the American Heart Association because she had family members who had suffered and died from heart disease.


• The U.S. National Alliance on Mental Health recently conducted a survey with teens ages 12–17 and found that only a minority of teens felt comfortable talking about their mental health regularly to their parents or friends. To help teens break the stigmas around mental health struggles, we’ve added the Wish You Knew podcast to a number of our articles’ Resources pages, including Anorexia Nervosa, Anxiety and Panic Attacks, and Mindfulness. Wish You Knew was created by 18-year-old Breiny Lipskier and gives friends and peers a platform to have important conversations about their journeys with mental health.


• Concerns about bird flu (avian influenza, or H5N1) increased in April 2024 when it was discovered that a strain of bird flu had spread among cattle in the United States, even appearing in inactive, fragmented traces of the virus in the U.S. milk supply. CDC officials warn against consuming dairy products made from raw milk, but note that the risk of H5N1 passing to humans through pasteurized milk products is low. We’ve updated our Avian Flu article with the latest developments.