Date of Award
Summer 2025
Document Type
Open Access Dissertation
Department
College of Nursing
First Advisor
Robin M. Dawson
Abstract
Background: Within the American South, marginalized Black populations continue to suffer from health disparities. A key resource that could aid in the prevention of health disparities such as teen pregnancy is the school nurse. School nurses are well positioned to assist in the development of independent health maintenance among student populations. However, school nurses remain understaffed and underfunded throughout most of the United States, which limits their effectiveness. It is possible that within southern states there are inequities in how school resources are allocated that have ties to segregation and redlining practices that systemically marginalized Black populations throughout the 1900s. The purpose of this project was to understand disparities in health and academic outcomes across the state of Georgia in the context of segregation/redlining to understand if adequate staffing of school nurses could be a path forward for promoting health/academic equity and prevention of teen pregnancy.
Methods: Secondary data were collected from the Georgia Department of Education (GADOE) and the Georgia Department of Public Health (GADPH) to analyze school nurse staffing, educational quality indicators, and teen pregnancy rates. In addition, data were collected from the University of Richmond’s Mapping Inequality to capture redlining/segregation in Atlanta, as well as the Social Vulnerability Index (SVI) from the Centers for Disease Control and Rural-Urban Continuum Codes (RUCC) from the United States Department of Agriculture. Descriptive statistics, linear regression, spatial autocorrelation, and Getis Ord Gi* mapping were used to analyze data.
Results: The analysis revealed a statistically significant relationship between school nurse staffing levels and academic outcomes across the state of Georgia. Geospatial analysis revealed that patterns of nurse staffing and academic outcomes may follow histories of segregation and redlining. Analysis of redlining in the city of Atlanta revealed that statistically significant clusters of teen pregnancy are found in redlined neighborhoods and these clusters follow statistically significant clusters of low school quality measures.
Discussion: This analysis indicates that the school nurse may be a pathway forward for policymakers and public health interventionists dedicated to breaking cycles of marginalization and systemic racism in marginalized communities.
Rights
© 2025, Bridget Hamilton
Recommended Citation
Hamilton, B.(2025). Assessing Health and Academic Disparities in the Deep South: The Enduring Impact of Segregation and Redlining in Georgia. (Doctoral dissertation). Retrieved from https://scholarcommons.sc.edu/etd/8356