Letter from the Director

Dear STRIDE family,

Happy 2015! Here’s to a year filled with good health, joy and success for all. At STRIDE, we are extremely fortunate to have a wonderful network of students, staff and community members who keep us healthy in so many ways, bring us lots of joy, and help us succeed.

STRIDE is active across the state and the country these days. Our Fit for Delivery team presented not one but three papers at the Obesity Society conference in Boston, Mass. We have been working with the Cal Poly – French Hospital Medical Center Research Collaboration, finding ways to advance health through groundbreaking research. We have also partnered with the Institute for Advanced Technology and Public Policy (IATPP) at Cal Poly to help improve the quality of life in resource-poor rural communities in California. Another series of collaborations has taken our flagship Pink and Dude Chefs program to Shandon, Calif., about 50 miles away, and Nashville, Tenn., about 2,000 miles away. Our sincerest thanks go out to our wonderful partners at French Hospital, IATPP, the YMCA and Vanderbilt University.

Our in-house activities are also flourishing. Twenty-five Health Ambassadors are Learning by Doing community-based health promotion activities, and our Assessment Team (A-Team) is busy collecting data as part of a kinesiology graduate student research project. Luckily, we have a new STRIDE Coordinator, Casey Heaney, to keep us organized. Welcome, Casey!

And finally, you asked for it — STRIDE’s community lunches are back! Every other Friday, you're invited to stop by, see your colleagues, do some networking, and chat with your friends over a delicious and simple meal courtesy of our STRIDE team chefs. Ask Casey to put you on our email list for more details.

See you at lunch,

Aydin Nazmi