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Access to adequate nutrition is a human right. In 2023, 23% of Australian households were severely food insecure, reducing food intake, skipping meals or days of eating. Food insecurity in early childhood is linked to poor health and development. Specifically, breakfast provides children with the necessary nutrients required for sustained attention, memory, and cognitive growth. Australian research has reported that one in three children aged 8–18 years regularly skip breakfast. However, there is little understanding of the prevalence of food insecurity among young children in Australia.

This study assessed if the association between mental disorders and higher student absences varies across different profiles of risk factors, and estimated the proportion of student absences associated with mental disorders. Data included responses from a nationally representative Australian survey of child and adolescent mental health.

Children with adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) can have difficulty adapting to the school context and may therefore be more likely to be suspended. We examined the association between ACEs and suspensions using linked administrative data on children born in Western Australia from July 2003–June 2004.

Depression and anxiety are often first experienced during childhood and adolescence, and interest in the prevention of these disorders is growing. The focus of this review was to assess the effectiveness of psychological prevention programs delivered in schools, and to provide an update to our previous review from five years ago (Werner-Seidler, Perry, Calear, Newby, & Christensen, 2017).

To explore the perceptions of parents who had a child or adolescent (6-18 years) diagnosed with a rare disease who attended a mainstream school in Western Australia. Design and methods: A cross-sectional online survey was conducted with 41 parents of children with a rare disease.

The majority of children acquire language effortlessly but approximately 10% of all children find it difficult especially in the early or preschool years with consequences for many aspects of their subsequent development and experience: literacy, social skills, educational qualifications, mental health and employment.

The growing global prevalence of autism spectrum disorder is associated with increasing costs for support services. Ascertaining the effects of a successful preemptive intervention for infants showing early behavioral signs of autism on human services budgets is highly policy relevant.

Schools are increasingly recognized as important settings for mental health promotion, but it is unclear what actions schools should prioritize to promote student mental health and wellbeing. We undertook a policy review of global school-based mental health promotion policy documents from United Nations agencies to understand the frameworks they use and the actions they recommend for schools.

This study addresses a knowledge gap in the literature about early adolescent cyberbullying victimization and the related positive and negative emotional wellbeing and academic achievement outcomes experienced over time. 

Globally, as scale up of early childhood education (ECE) continues, monitoring ECE quality is imperative to promote service aspects that drive positive outcomes for children. Monitoring of ECE quality in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) is scarce, limited by challenges in varied conceptualisations of quality, lack of measurement tools that reflect local culture and context, and implementation difficulties in low resource settings.