The Salem Health and Wellness Foundation (SH&WF) has awarded $138,524 to four organizations to support children and families in establishing healthy lifestyles that will focus on improved nutrition and reduce childhood obesity. Funded programs will be implemented in educational settings as well as emergency food providers/social service agencies.
Rutgers Cooperative Extensions’ Family & Community Health Sciences will work with area schools to expand its successful Grow Healthy School Wellness initiative that promotes consumption of healthy foods, encourages Farm-to-School learning experiences and promotes increased physical activities, along with outreach strategies that engage the community and families.
The Salem County YMCA plans to pilot its Healthy U school based program utilizing the CATCH (Coordinated Approach To Child Health) curriculum to a local school district. CATCH is the most cost-effective program proven to prevent childhood obesity. The overarching goal would be to expand CATCH to additional schools over the course of the next few years.
The Salem High School Based Youth Services’ Get Up and Move pilot program will focus on females centering on the importance of physical activity and healthy eating utilizing the Let’s Move 5-2-1-0 Middle and High School Toolkits.
Catholic Charities’ Salem Nutrition program’s priority is to strengthen the food pantries in Salem County by developing a coalition. The goal of the program is to improve the health of emergency food recipients through increased access to fresh fruits and vegetables and increased knowledge through nutrition education.
The SH&WF has partnered with The Food Trust to assist in the development of its goals and objectives in the Healthy Kids, Bright Futures initiative recognizing that focused driven funding will make a better impact on the disparities of health.
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