It's not like a cat...: Growing Up Healthy: Five Years of Progress!

Last week I was lucky enough to attend the Harvard Pilgrim Health Care Foundation's luncheon celebrating five years of Growing Up Healthy, their five-year leadership and funding initiative to reduce and prevent childhood obesity in Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and Maine.

Childhood health is near and dear to my heart. I was lucky to grow up on a farm, running through the woods, climbing the trees, building hay forts in the barn, and helping to tend the animals. My mother made us wonderful homemade meals, and we always ate dinner together as a family, every day at 5:30. My mom packed our lunches for school.

I try to provide the same for my own children. I get them outside as much as possible. I make them wholesome meals with lean meats, whole grains, and fresh vegetables. We support a farmer through a CSA, and my kids love picking up the vegetables every Tuesday. We're lucky to live near good parks and to be able to afford scooters and bikes so my children can ride and have fun and bike to daycare and preschool.

But not everyone is this lucky, and due to our changing cultural landscape (schedules, screen time, school lunches, nutrition at home), childhood obesity is on the rise. That's where Growing Up Healthy comes in. The foundation did research on childhood obesity and started taking action. What they realized was that

It's not enough to raise awareness, or simply give kids information or special activities. The nutritious food and physical activity that keep kids at a healthy weight have to be party of the everyday environment; an integrated part of how they live their lives. Healthy choices have to be the only options at every point in a child's day.?

--Karen Voci, Executive Director's Message, Gaining Traction: a five-year progress report, Growing Up Healthy, p. 2

To do this, the foundation? focused on children ages 6-12 and aimed to do the following:

• disseminate information about strategies that work
• give financial support to schools and afterschool programs
• support public policy changes that "institutionalize what's working"

Last week's luncheon, held at the Museum of Science, Boston, featured Dr. Robert D. Putnam as a keynote speaker, and then--as if that weren't enticing enough--had Martha Bebinger of WBUR interview Dr. Putnam. (Heck yes I wanted to be there for that!) You may recognize Putnam as the author of Bowling Alone and Making Democracy Work. He's currently a professor of public policy at Harvard. I was really excited about the opportunity to hear him speak.
He did not let me down. Putnam, who is from a small factory town without much economic diversity, was funny, engaging, and impassioned. He spoke of changes in Port Clinton, Ohio, a town where--once factories closed down--now has $2 million homes in gated communities along the lake, as well as $11,000 double-wide trailers. "Since the 1970s," he said, "America has become more divided among class lines." It's economic class, he emphasized, not race, that really divides the country. A college education, according to Putnam, closes the race gap...but widens the class gap.
While enrichment expenditures is rising for some families, it's falling for others. Some parents have the income to be able to relax and spend more time reading "Good Night Moon" and to spend time and money on sports and music classes. Working class kids, on the other hand, are increasingly socially isolated, especially in towns and schools where you have to pay to play sports. Social connectedness decreases, as does social trust.

As for obesity, he says, the more attention we pay to it, the wider the gap. Parents of means know about it and know what to do to prevent it; poorer people may not be as able to pay attention to it. Education is key, Putnam emphasizes. "If your parents only have a high school education, your goose is cooked," he said. He related the story of meeting with someone who'd brought along his children, because they'd never before seen someone who'd been to college, and the man wanted his children to meet Dr. Putman for that reason.

Bebinger's interview of Dr. Putnam was even more enlightening. She asked Putnam what his top three recommendations would be if President Obama were to call him today. "Pay attention to the family," he said. His main recommendations would be:

• We need to provide jobs and wages.
• It needs to be easier and more desirable for people to get married.
• Education is really important.
• Early childhood education is really important, too.?
• We need more mentoring/volunteering situations ("more hugs," as he put it).

The awards ceremony honored Dora Ann Mills, current Vice President for Clinical Affairs at University of New England and former Director of the Maine Center for Disease Control and Prevention, who has been instrumental in tackling health issues in rural Maine;

New Hampshire State Senator Nancy Stiles, who has focused on childhood obesity and nutrition in New Hampshire;

and John Auerbach, Director of the Institute on Urban Health Research at Northeastern University and former Massachusetts Department of Public Health Commissioner, who developed and greatly expanded the Mass in Motion program.

The second phase of Growing Up Healthy is beginning, continuing to change policies and create healthier environments. Let's hope that in a few short years, such initiatives won't even be necessary!

Source: http://notlikeacat.blogspot.com/2012/11/growing-up-healthy-five-years-of.html

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