J&J Scholar Julia Wolfson, Doctoral Student and lead author of a recent study called “Is Cooking at Home Associated With Better Diet Quality or Weight Loss Intention?”  has provided her input to the following article on TRIB Total Media.

Cooking, Enjoying Family Dinners Feeds a Range of Benefits

Action for Healthy Kids

Sparking Change Through Every Kid Healthy™ Week

By Elizabeth Sorice, Chicago Research Associate, AFHK

Posted May, 23 2014

Sometimes all it takes is one event to ignite community-wide excitement for health and wellness. Through a multi-year grant from Action for Healthy kids, made possible by Johnson and Johnson Services, Inc. and the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Chicago’s Dewey School of Excellence made it happen. Through the grant Dewey was able to prioritize nutrition and physical education for their students and local community.

On April 24, 2014, Dewey organized its first ever Family Fitness Night in celebration of Every Kid Healthy™ Week. The event kicked off with Physical Education teacher, Mr. Horton, getting everyone up and moving together. Students and parents were instructed to rotate between several fitness, nutrition education and healthy eating stations. There was even a hula hoop booth!

Once everyone made their rounds Mr. Horton lead them through a group cool down. He took this moment to emphasize the importance of drinking water and snacking on healthier options to refuel. To the children’s dismay chips of the flaming hot variety were not included in his recommendations. He then guided everyone through a final series of exercises and stretches to show them how it’s possible to be active in a small space without equipment. The goal was to show families simple ways to build physical activity into a daily routine.

At the end of the day participants were awarded a finishers medal, certificate of completion and a goodie bag filled with carrots, granola bars, bananas and oranges. Mr. Horton exclaimed that the Family Fitness Night was “the groundbreaking first step for not only the students and families, but for the entire community.” Because of the success of the night he announced to the group that he planned to initiate monthly Family Fitness Nights. Students and parents cheered, smiled and threw each other high fives.

 

More J&J Community Health Care Program Grantees and Scholars at December 2012 NIH Health Disparities Summit in Washington

Below are more photos of J&J Community Health Care Scholars and Grantees as they present their posters at the 2012 NIH Summit.

J&J Community Health Care Granteee Institute for Family Health from Bronx, NY with their poster presentation.

J&J Community Health Care Granteee African Family Health Organization, Oni Richards from Philadelphia, PA 



J&J Community Health Care Granteee Joy Southfield Community Development Corporation, Dave Law from Detroit, MI discusses poster with conference attendee.



J&J Community Health Care Program Present Posters at December 2012 NIH Health Disparities Summit

Four Johnson & Johnson Community Health Care Program grantees and scholars were chosen  to present posters at the December 2012 NIH Health Disparities Summit held in Washington, DC.  Below are two photos from this event.

J&J Scholar Stephen Stake,  with Ashley Reid from Congreso De Latinos Unidos, Philadelphia, PA presenting at 2012 NIH Health Disparities Summit.

  

J&J Scholar Priya Palta,  with Ifetayo Johnson and  Valisa Perry from United Health Organization, Detroit, MI presenting at 2012 NIH Health Disparities Summit.

 4777 E. Outer Drive

Suite 1340

Detroit, Mi 48234-3241

Ph: (313) 826-7099  Fax: (313) 826-7098

www.theyouthconnetion.org

The I2D2-Fit ‘N’ Fun Family Club has made a tremendous impact in promoting health awareness in the Osborn community.  The simplicity of our message to increase fruit and vegetable intake, physical activity, and decrease intake of sweetened beverages and screen time has been met with positive feedback with outstanding outcomes.  For example: Results show that 89% of participants increased their knowledge of the recommended number of daily fruit/vegetable servings.  By the end of the program 85% of the participants engaged in at least sixty minutes of physical activity a day.  We have held eight, six-week, sessions and had a total of 263 participants in the program.  The core lessons are understandable, obtainable, and realistic.  It is encouraging to see when people truly understand why health, exercise, and nutrition are so important.  As a testament to our program, participants have indicated the lessons they learned have enabled them to make the connection between diet, exercise, and some of their health issues they were facing like, high blood pressure and diabetes.

Three participants in particular saw incredible results.  Ms. Jackson, a 27 year old mother of one, was diagnosed with Type 2 Diabetes.  Doctors immediately put her on numerous medications.  After she and her daughter went through the I2D2-Fit ‘N’ Fun Family Club program, she put into practice what she learned and now she is only taking one medication.  Her doctors believe that if she continues this healthy lifestyle she will be completely off medication.  Another participant, Ms. Edwards, went through the program with her four children.  She wanted to lose weight because she was tired of feeling exhausted and not having enough energy.  After completing the six week program and utilizing what she was taught on her own, she was able to lose 20 pounds.  Finally, Mrs. Cooper, a Grandmother who decided to bring her granddaughter to I2D2, wrote us a letter about her lifestyle change.  In the letter Mrs. Cooper explained how she suffered with sleep apnea and other health issues due to being overweight.  After she found out what kinds of food she should be eating along with the types of exercises that she could do around the house not only did she see a decrease in weight, but her sleep apnea went away as well.

The Youth Connection is committed to this community and promoting health and nutrition awareness through our I2D2- Fit ‘N’ Fun Club.  Based on the success of our program in the Osborn Community the Youth Connection has received funding to expand the program to three other communities in Detroit.  We also requested to submit a proposal to expand the program to other communities in Wayne County.



Get on the Map!
We recently participated in an online seminar about using

Community Commons.

Community Commons is an interactive mapping, networking, and learning utility for the broad-based healthy, sustainable, and livable communities’ movement. Registered users have FREE access to:

§  Over 7000 GIS data layers at state, county, zip code, block group, tract, and point-levels.

§  Contextualized mapping, visualization, analytic, impact and communication tools and apps.

§  Searchable profiles of hundreds of place-based community initiatives (multi-sector collaboratives) working towards healthy/sustainable/livable/equitable communities - funded by government and private philanthropy - complete with text & video narratives on "what's working."

§  Peer learning forums in the "interactive commons" with colleagues exploring similar interests and challenges - hosted by leading national Technical Assistance providers.

The Commons is a democratized learning and innovation platform for:

§  enhancing the reach and impact of currently-funded place based investments;

§  applying an asset-based approach to help grow and sustain impact once the funding is over;

§  supporting communities of highest burden who neither have grant financing, nor cohorts.

Community Commons is an initiative of Advancing the Movement, and powered by Institute for People, Place and Possibilities (IP3). In-kind and technical support has come from scores of individuals and organizations around the nation. Early financial support for Advancing the Movement and The Commons was made possible by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Kaiser Permanente, Ascension Health, the YMCA of the USA, The Convergence Partnership and IP3 (a partnership of Community Initiatives, the Center for Applied Research and Environmental Studies, and Transtria)

Bronx Health REACH-"The Super Starions" Healthy Eating Challenge

By Diana Johnson

Bronx Health REACH has worked to improve children’s eating habits through a variety of different programs over the years. This year, REACH partnered with Worldways Strategy & Creative to develop a social marketing campaign to encourage students to eat healthy foods. Social marketing, not to be confused with social media, is a framework that can be used to encourage behavior change by using commercial marketing strategies. In this case, REACH developed a healthy eating campaign to “sell” the idea of eating more fruits and vegetables to children aged 8-10 years old. To start, a focus group was conducted with fourth and fifth grade students to get feedback about the best ways to promote healthy eating messages. The children were presented with three different types of characters: Astronauts; Athletes; and Superheroes. The children picked the superheroes and decided the superheroes should look like them and have normal names like students in their classrooms. They also wanted the superheroes to have fruits and vegetables as logos on their outfits. Worldways went straight to work with the feedback the children gave during the focus group and shortly after the Super Starions were born!

The Super Starions, which include Frankie Fruitman, Victor Veggie, and Wanda Water, are the main characters of the campaign that is currently being implemented at PS 218 Rafael Hernandez Dual Language School in the South Bronx. Third grade students were invited to participate in a healthy eating challenge through a series of nine missions to help the Super Starions fight for good health. Posters featuring the Super Starions were placed around the school to remind students to complete their missions and table tents were placed in the cafeteria to prompt the students to make healthy choices.  In addition, the campaign reinforces the nutrition education the children received in the classroom as part of the Johnson & Johnson Obesity Prevention Program.

 “I thought it was something they don’t see every day,” said school nurse Veronica Echols about the healthy eating campaign. “All the kids were enthusiastic about it.” Third grader Alejandra Romero said she learned to eat more fruits and vegetables and especially enjoyed missions that involved some community exploration. “My favorite mission was in the community because I got to try a banana at a healthy cart [Green Cart] by the hair salon,” said Alejandra.

The campaign is being evaluated using pre and post surveys which ask about student’s knowledge, attitudes and behaviors around healthy eating. REACH was recently awarded a grant from the CIGNA Foundation to expand the social marketing campaign to other schools in fall 2012.