Kan. High School Students Now Required to Learn CPR

New standard means all Kansas high school students must learn CPR

The Kansas City Star

Dec. 23—Starting in the fall, high school students across Kansas will be required to learn CPR.

The new standard, approved by the Kansas State Board of Education earlier this month, makes Kansas the 38th state in the country to have CPR training as a high school graduation requirement, The Lawrence Journal-World reports.

It's estimated that nearly 33,000 students will be trained in CPR statewide after the new requirement goes into effect next school year. Some Kansas school districts already have local requirements for students to learn CPR.

At Baldwin High School, students have had the training as part of their health curriculum for more than a decade. Every student at Baldwin High is required to take the class, which also teaches students how to use automated external defibrillators, or AEDs.

"It is a really important skill that our kids should have, and all of our kids are getting that and more because they're doing the AED training at the same time," Paul Dorathy, superintendent and curriculum director for Baldwin City schools, told the Journal-World.

To support the new requirements, the American Heart Association has pledged $25,000 worth of training kits to be distributed among seven regional service centers for school use.