Students need the opportunity to lead themselves through our convoluted world of public health. As a guide I will offer a cooking club experience where they will hone their healthy cooking skills, explore food system research (nutrition), and apply both to their communities in an effort to better themselves and their families. This hands-on community organizing resource will help to mobilize support for these young activists and reinforce key nutrition/health goals. Students will take ownership, challenge their friends and families to live well, and have fun doing it.
This program aims to convene the in-school education effort with the community education efforts. The young people are the perfect focus point. Directing additional resources to them for the purpose of organizing their communities around their nutrition/health related passions will accomplish more than you or I can imagine. The future is in the hands of the youth, it's about time they got their hands dirty.
Specifically, I would like to offer cooking/community organizing series' with the stated purpose of putting students in the driver's seat for their communities. Through weekly meetings preparing unique nutritious dishes and conversations about current health issues specific to their area, these young people will think critically and creatively about what they can do to make an impact. Strategies will be outlined and plans of actions will be implemented by and for the young people.
The By & For programming will have the effect of bringing nutrition home to these young people. We must look at the child as a part of a larger network influencing their health. We can expect no less of our children as they take their place as the future leaders of our schools, communities, and more.
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