Exclusive Reports

Local Wellness Policy Implementation:
Strategies and Successes in Michigan

A new field report from Michigan Action for Healthy Kids, features the Team's collaboration with the Michigan Department of Education and the Michigan Department of Community Health to facilitate statewide implementation of Local Wellness Policies. Local Wellness Policy Implementation: Strategies and Successes in Michigan highlights a four-pronged strategy to address the challenge of assisting, measuring, and influencing statewide implementation of meaningful Wellness Policies.

Beyond the School Day:
Utilizing After-School as Part of a School Wellness Strategy

This field report from Action for Healthy Kids highlights how the Tennessee, Colorado, Missouri, and Alabama Action for Healthy Kids Teams utilized after-school hours to expand, build on, and enhance efforts to encourage good nutrition and physical activity. Using ReCharge! Energizing After-School, these Teams engaged parents in after-school wellness activities, partnered with a local community organization to implement the curriculum and implemented effective strategies for securing and retaining after-school staff, and for providing training. The report demonstrates how after-school can be used to promote healthy eating and physical activity for students, and to support schools’ efforts towards meeting their overall wellness goals.

Ideas, Commitment, Action, Results: Model
Projects Advancing the Cause of School Wellness

This Action for Healthy Kids field report features the projects of three Action for Healthy Kids Teams that focus on improving school wellness practices. The report highlights how the Michigan Team supported Local Wellness Policy implementation by creating and disseminating a nuts-and-bolts Healthy School Toolkit for school districts across the state, and by hosting regional training sessions. The Ohio Team recognized an unfulfilled need in the state’s school wellness landscape and executed a social marketing effort that focused on encouraging greater school and student participation in school breakfast programs. The third project from the Alabama Team, addressed the shortage of physical activity and education equipment by creating and distributing physical education kits to 35 low-income rural schools.

Engaging School Leaders as Partners in Creating Healthy Schools:

This publication provides tips and insights for those who want to work more purposefully to build positive working relationships with educational leaders, to improve the health and wellbeing of students. This resource was developed especially for Action for Healthy Kids Teams to understand and collaborate with school leaders in order to support the goals and objectives of their Action Plans. Direct input from educational leaders is designed to help you cultivate relationships or to take your relationships with school leaders to the next level. The report also offers recommendations on how to build an effective outreach and engagement strategy, as well as insights on how best to engage specific groups of school leaders.

From the Top Down: Engaging School Leaders in Creating a Healthier, More Physically Active School Environment

Support and buy-in from school leaders - superintendents, principals and administrators - is crucial for school wellness initiatives to successfully infiltrate the school culture and bring about lasting change. Engaging school leaders, however, presents a hefty challenge for advocates as these key players already have full agendas and competing priorities. This Action for Healthy Kids report coveys the stories of three Action for Healthy Kids Teams that strategized and creatively devised ways to not only get the issue on the 'radar screens' of school leaders, but to propel their school wellness initiatives to the top of their to-do lists.

Giving Kids the Voice of Authority: Engaging Students in the Fight Against Childhood Obesity

Working to improve nutrition and physical activity in schools, it is not uncommon that advocacy groups and community organizations neglect to account for the opinions and guidance of those people most affected by the movement – the students. This report demonstrates that, given the opportunity, students sincerely want to take responsibility for developing and implementing healthy eating and physical activity solutions in their schools – that because of their unmatchable energy, dedication, creativity and knowledge, students are essential collaborators for programs and initiatives that find long-term success.

Tapping Into the Power: Engaging Parents in the Fight Against Childhood Obesity

Action for Healthy Kids has always operated according to the principle that impacting schools' approaches to nutrition and physical activity requires many participants – perhaps none more important than parents. This field report showcases how two of our Teams have actively engaged parents with targeted programming and how they have measured their success.

A Mission Becomes a Mandate: Campaign for School Wellness

Offers a comprehensive description of Action for Healthy Kids' multi-year Campaign for School Wellness. This initiative will ensure that the Local Wellness Policies now federally mandated bring about improvements to school nutrition and physical activity. As Action for Healthy Kids national grassroots partnership provides the support that schools need, Local Wellness Policies will reach their potential and propel systemic change to ensure that all kids develop the lifelong habits necessary to promote health and learning.

Helping Students Make Better Food Choices in School

Last school year, a dozen Illinois schools participated in a project to test various approaches to improving school-based nutrition. These schools implemented strategies to improve student food choices. Several organizations and businesses, including Action for Healthy Kids, were part of a working group which provided technical support and expertise to the schools. This report outlines the work undertaken with these 12 schools, and, importantly, includes several key findings regarding how we can best support our schools as they move from developing their local wellness policies to actually implementing and monitoring those policies.

Parents' Views on School Wellness Practices

In order to learn the views that parents currently have on the issues of nutrition and physical activity in schools, as well as the changes parents believe are most needed in schools, Action for Healthy Kids conducted a national survey with parents. The survey of parents of school-aged children found a significant gap between what parents believe is happening and what is actually happening in terms of nutrition and physical activity in America’s schools.

The Learning Connection: The Value of Improving Nutrition and Physical Activity in Our Schools

Action for Healthy Kids' exclusive landmark report documents how the excessive rise in poor nutrition, inactivity and weight problems is adversely affecting academic achievement and possibly costing schools millions of dollars each year. The report calls on schools to work with partners to take immediate action to address the issue, and points to current best practices in schools, school districts, and states.

Criteria for Evaluating School Based Approaches to Increasing Good Nutrition and Physical Activity

This report defines a set of standard criteria for creating and evaluating school-based approaches for improving nutrition and physical activity. In order for schools to implement best practices, they must know what works under what conditions. These criteria can be applied to a broad range of practices, policies and programs to measure their potential effectiveness and adoptability.

Taking Action for Healthy Kids: A Report on the Healthy Schools Summit and the Action for Healthy Kids Initiative

The 2002 Healthy Schools Summit launched the nationwide Action for Healthy Kids initiative to chart a healthier course for our nation's youth. This report highlights ideas and solutions shared at the 2002 Healthy Schools Summit and sets forth the Action for Healthy Kids vision for creating health-promoting schools that support sound nutrition and physical activity.