Working on Wellness Environments
Working on Wellness Environments (WOW-E) is a Texas A&M AgriLife Extension multidisciplinary community development program

What is Farm to School?

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The Eagle’s orchard at R.T. Barrera has been partially funded by donations and most recently, as part of a Starr County Farm to School grant. The National Farm to School effort sprouted in 1996-1997 from the desire to support community-based food systems, strengthen family farms, and improve student health by reducing childhood obesity. In 2004, the National Farm to School Program was officially authorized, and included 400 programs in 22 states. The Farm to School Network was founded in 2007. The National Farm to School network’s first 

decade of efforts focused on developing a strong network of partnerships across sectors, building awareness about farm to school and increasing activities at the state and regional levels through training, capacity building, and policy advocacy.

Farm to school enriches the connection communities have with fresh, healthy food and local food producers by changing food purchasing and education practices at schools and early care and education sites. Like at R.T Barrera, students gain access to healthy, local foods, as well as education opportunities such as school gardens, cooking lessons and farm field trips. Farm to school empowers children and their families to make informed food choices while strengthening the local economy and contributing to vibrant communities

Farm to school implementation differs by location but always includes one or more of the following:
– Procurement: local foods are purchased, promoted and served in the cafeteria or as a snack or taste-test.
– School Gardens: students engage in hands-on learning through gardening; and
– Education: students participate in education activities to agriculture, food, health or nutrition

Today, there are 42,587 schools involved, 42% of US schools, 23.6 million students engaged, $789m spent on local food, 46 states with supportive policies, and 20,000+ nfsn members. To learn more, you can go here.

Team Member Spotlight

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The Working on Wellness Environments team would like to extend our best wishes to our own Kelsey Coats. As an Extension Assistant of Program Outreach PSE, Kelsey has been involved in every aspect of the WOW-E project from providing technical assistance for community planning efforts, logistical support for site visits and workshops, to contributing to the communication efforts.

Kelsey began her career with Texas A&M Agrilife Extension as a student worker with the Urban and Municipal Parks program, where she excelled in this role for a year and half. After graduating, Kelsey transitioned into a full-time role with WOW-E and Texas A&M Ag

rilife Extension’s Urban and Municipal Parks Program. Kelsey’s background and experience in Recreation, Park, and Tourism Sciences and her previous work in community planning, allowed her to succeed as part of the physical activity subject matter expert team, as well as the communications team.

When the RFA process was introduced, Kelsey had a key role in guiding communities through readiness assessments, asset identification, and setting clear goals and action steps. As projects progressed into planning phases, Kelsey’s involvement included leading walking audits in Rio Grande City and Sierra Blanca, TX, planning pop-ups with the downtown Rio Grande City, TX group, planning story walks with the Rio Grande City Library in Rio Grande City, TX, and guiding all groups through various site inventories. Additionally, Kelsey shared these best practices with other communit

y leaders at two state conference presentations and in her article for NRPA (see below).

Instrumental to the communications team, Kelsey has been involved with social media, newsletter and blog creation, and has taken lead in creating videos that highlight the dedicated community champions of our 4 counties. With strong writing skills and a bird’s eye view of best practices, Kelsey was invited to write an article for the National Recreation and Park Association magazine, where she highlighted community engagement in relation to the WOW-E project. Kelsey participated in a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention panel, where she was invited to speak about the communication efforts of WOW-E and our local coalitions who are active followers of the communication pieces.

Kelsey’s favorite part of being in this role is working with a multidisciplinary team. She enjoys looking at issues from a health standpoint. She also enjoys getting to know our four counties and seeing local groups get excited about making change in their counties.

 

As for her steps, Kelsey will be attending Cornell University in Ithaca, New York where she will be pursuing a master of Regional Planning. She is excited to not only approach planning with her background in parks, but with health in mind.

The WOW-E team would like to thank Kelsey for her dedicated contributions to WOW-E. While we will not see her as much, we are looking forward to continue working with her on a part-time basis.

Meeting Digitally

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The COVID-19 pandemic has forced many of us to work differently. Whether it’s taking on a new or additional job or household responsibilities, quarantining at home or wearing facial masks and protective gear, we’ve all had to adapt to these unprecedented times. This also includes adapting our outreach for WOW-E and working with many groups to meet online.

After some initial time to adjust to COVID-19, some local coalition groups and the WOW-E team have been able to engage in planning meetings and coalition meetings online. Victorino Cantu, in Starr County, and the counting experts from TTI (Texas Transportation Institute) were able to “visit”, plan, and troubleshoot pre-use counts using Zoom, Google Earth, mapped cell phone images, email, and good old fashion phone calls.

Of course, these new changes come with challenges. Most of our coalition members are involved in frontline COVID-19 response efforts. Additionally, internet access and access to computers prohibited some from being a part of the efforts as mentioned by one of our groups in Webb county. Finally, some members may have no experience with zoom. While some have found asking their children and grandchildren for help has been helpful, and are on their way to becoming zoom professionals, others do no see this as the solution for themselves!

Please be reassured that we continue to work with our local agents and team members are listening to you all as we work together in responding to and adapting our outreach to continue to support local coalitions in the efforts to continue to push for healthier infrastructure and systems in your local communities. Know that you can reach out to me with questions, ideas, or concerns through my email valeria.jauregui@ag.tamu.edu or my direct phone line (956) 821-1476.

February is Heart Month

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This month marks the 56th consecutive heart month initiative. According to the American Heart Association, heart disease is the number one killer in the United States. The initiative promotes the importance of heart health and the need for more research, with a reminder to get everyone involved. Cardiovascular disease (heart disease and stroke combined) kills about 2,300 a day. Obesity in both youth and adults is at an all-time high. The American Heart Association wants you to consider these facts:

  • Heart disease kills more people than all forms of cancer combined
  • Heart attacks affect more people every year than the population of Dallas, Texas.
  • 83% believe that heart attacks can be prevented but aren’t motivated to do anything.
  • 72% of Americans don’t consider themselves at risk for heat disease.
  • And 58% put no effort into improving their heart health.

While there have been advances in medicine, the AHA says unhealthy lifestyle choices combined with rising obesity rates in both kids and adults have hindered progress fighting heart disease.

“The good news is that heart disease is preventable in most cases with healthy choices, which include not smoking, maintaing a healthy weight, controlling blood sugar and cholestrol, treating high blood pressure, getting at least 150 minutes of moderate-intesity physical activity a week and getting regular checkups.”

Working on Wellness Environments- Texas A&M Agrilife Extension is joining these efforts by promoting healthy foods and physical activity, supporting and providing technical assistance for the creation of local food systems, and working with local communities to create walkable downtowns and connecting safe, accessible areas to everyday destinations.

Tomorrow, February 7th, is National Wear Red Day! Go red for the awareness and prevention of heart disease. For more information, visit goredforwomen.org

Thanks to Dr. Jenna Anding for the resources!

Nationwide Launch of CDC’s Active People, Healthy Nation Initiative

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Today, CDC released new maps that highlight geographic and racial/ethnic disparities in physical inactivity in the U.S. State and territory-level estimates of physical inactivity range from 17% in Colorado to 48% in Puerto Rico. In the majority of states, non-Hispanic blacks and Hispanics had a significantly higher prevalence of inactivity than non-Hispanic whites. These data show that more efforts are needed to increase physical activity to prevent and control chronic disease in the U.S.

To address this issue, CDC just announced the launch of Active People, Healthy NationSM, a new initiative to help 27 million Americans become more physically active by 2027. The initiative promotes strategies that work at the state and local level and is based on a foundation of inclusion and health equity.

Working on Wellness Environments joined Active People, Healthy Nation, and we invite you to do the same. Individuals, organizations, and community champions that support any of the strategies that work can join.

  • Organizations can join to help expand the effort, receive regular updates and exclusive networking opportunities, and share success stories with a broader network.
  • Champions can join and implement community changes that are supportive of physical activity.
  • Individuals can engage in physical activity and support the work through your personal networks.

By joining this initiative, we can collectively bring attention to the importance of being active, promote what works, highlight our successes, and galvanize support for physical activity nationwide.

You can also help promote Active People, Healthy Nation within your networks!

We thank you in advance for joining this movement and helping to promote it within your networks! If you have any questions about Active People, Healthy Nation, please email activepeople@cdc.gov.