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ERIC Number: EJ1054225
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2015
Pages: 7
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-0965-4283
EISSN: N/A
A Mobile Farmers' Market Brings Nutrition Education to Low-Income Students
Ellsworth, Devin; Ernst, Jenny; Snelling, Anastasia
Health Education, v115 n2 p171-177 2015
Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to examine the impact of a nutrition-education intervention delivered at low-income middle schools in Washington, DC in the USA, using a mobile farmers' market to bring hands-on lessons to schools. The program was a partnership between a local farm and university and was funded by the United States Department for Agriculture (USDA) Team Nutrition grant. Design/Methodology/Approach: Seven low-income middle schools received the intervention, which included 45-minute lessons focussed on nutrition education and sustainable farming concepts. The farmers' market was delivered via a converted school bus, allowing for full market setup at each school to provide local fruits and vegetables as teaching tools. The nutrition-education lesson focussed on the USDA MyPlate and healthy meal planning. The farm education component focussed on organic farming principles, sustainability of local food systems, and seasonality. A six question pre- and post-survey was administered to 408 participating middle school students to assess changes in knowledge. Findings: Overall, average scores increased from 51 to 58 percent. Nutrition knowledge questions increased from 58 to 74 percent, while agriculture questions remained constant at 43 percent. Both increases significant using a two-sample t-test (p<0.001). This suggests that students gained more nutrition education concepts in this format as compared to the agricultural concepts. Originality/Value: Childhood obesity is a growing epidemic that affects low-income communities disproportionally. Innovative strategies must be implemented to increase healthy food consumption. This case study presents such an approach and its value in increasing student knowledge of healthy behavior.
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Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Evaluative
Education Level: Middle Schools; Secondary Education; Junior High Schools
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Identifiers - Location: District of Columbia
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A