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Connect Academy: STRIDE Partners with IATPP to Make Nutrition Education Available in Resource-Poor Communities in California

STRIDE and IATPP Team Members


From left: STRIDE Director Aydin Nazmi, student fellows Michaela Clauss and Jessica Avalos, and Associate Director of IATPP, Christine Robertson.

STRIDE is partnering with the Cal Poly Institute for Advanced Technology and Public Policy (IATPP) to develop a nutrition education curriculum for students who have immigrated recently, have low literacy and are living in resource-poor communities in California. Christine Robertson, associate director of IATPP, explained that the inspiration for this project came while she was working in the state Senate with Sam Blakeslee, the founder of IATPP.

"Working in the state Senate, we were continually grappling with how to close the chronic achievement gap amongst minority students, particularly those from Spanish-language immigrant households. The contributing factors to the achievement gap are a complicated mix of educational resources, parental educational attainment, family language and literacy, and socioeconomic factors. Many existing programs aim to address a subset of these issues, but we did not see any programs that were seeking to address the broader portfolio of family needs,” she said. 

The nutrition education will be presented through an app for tablets. Nutrition major Michaela Clauss and kinesiology major Jessica Avalos are developing the content for the app, which will be in Spanish, and plan to present an action plan by the end of winter quarter. The content will include nutrition information, recipes and interactive tools. Once the content is written, they will send it to project partners who will create videos and other technology to accompany the content.

“The app will consist of six themed modules, each with a video, game or other interactive activity, and a take-away message or summary,” Clauss explained. Users will earn points through participation; these points can be put toward grocery and gas cards. The app is aimed at an intergenerational audience. Data shows that involving the entire family in the different modules will optimize impact and make healthy eating a family project.

The project will be launched in the Salinas Valley through collaboration with community partners including local schools.

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