This is part of our Building Support for Latino Families: A Research Review »
Latinos Kids Face a Big Gap in Early Cognitive Development
The socioeconomic gap in academic performance has been demonstrated repeatedly, with children from low-income households exhibiting deficits in school readiness and social development upon entering kindergarten. Several studies have shown that early educational gaps are maintained, and can even grow, for children from high-risk communities.12,15,23–26 Risk factors including poverty, low parental education, limited English proficiency, and single-parent homes, many of which are disproportionately present in Latino communities, put Latino children at a disadvantage for cognitive development relative to their non-Hispanic peers.27–30 In ...
This is part of our Building Support for Latino Families: A Research Review »
The Growth of Head Start
Given the evidence to support the benefit of organized early childhood education, development of high-quality ECE centers that also promote engagement of Latino parents holds great promise for the future of Latino children. Many programs from the 1960s and on provide evidence for the effectiveness of incorporating parent-targeted elements within early childcare programs, and these family-based approaches form the basis for the two-generation model discussed later in this review. The first explicit family-based program was Head Start, which in 1965 declared the goal of providing low-income preschool children a comprehensive program to meet their emotional, social, health, ...
Nutrition education—when it's accessible—can help low-income Latino and all families eat healthier. Four innovative projects used text messages, online programs, and other technologies to boost the reach and impact of nutrition education among participants in the Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) federal food assistance program. In each project, technology made nutrition education more accessible and useful. "Technology appears to have an impact on keeping our families in the program," said Dr. Shannon Whaley of UCLA, which led one of the studies. "This use of technology matters, and it is where WIC probably needs to go."
Why Is Nutrition Education a Big Deal?
Latinos tend to lack access to healthy food, according to a Salud America! Research Review. One big way ...
About 15% of U.S. Latinos had a diagnosable mental illness in the past year—that's enough people to fill New York City. How can this population achieve healthier minds? A healthy diet is, not surprisingly, a great first step. In fact, good nutrition protects against depression and anxiety; poor nutrition is a risk factor for those conditions, according to an emerging field of research. "By helping people shape their diets, we can improve their mental health and decrease their risk of psychiatric disorders," Dr. Drew Ramsey of Columbia University told WebMD.
The State of Mental Health
Only about 1 in 5 Americans consider themselves in optimal mental health. Depression afflicts more than a quarter adults. By 2020, depression will rank as the second-leading cause of ...
The streetcar is back along the Texas-Mexico border, thanks to a Latino man's brilliant "fake" ad campaign. Peter Svarzbein, an El Paso native, loved how a historic international streetcar system used to connect downtown El Paso, Texas (82.2% Latino) to downtown Cuidad Juárez, Mexico. But it closed in 1974. Today many in El Paso lack public transportation to reach places they need to go, which harms their health, educational, and employment opportunities, and the economy. So Svarzbein created a fictional, yet powerful ad campaign to simulate the return of El Paso's border-crossing streetcar for his graduate thesis project at New York's School for Visual Arts. Svarzbein's El Paso Transnational Trolley Project sparked enough curiosity and enthusiasm to create a real ...
Many families aren't as active as they would like to be because they lack safe places to walk, bike and play. In fact, the U.S. is failing five of nine factors that reflect walking and walkable communities. Latinos in particular face barriers to walk, which negatively impacts physical and mental health, as well as economic prosperity. Are you interested in helping to make walking more commonplace for families in your community?
Micro Grants;
America Walks is hosting a round of micro grants for up to $1500 to fund or start smaller-scale, low-cost projects and programs. The goal is to increase the prevalence of walking, expand the diversity of people and organizations working to advance walkability, and help to make walking safer, easier, and more fun for all community ...
Latinos face many barriers to health care, including language differences; complex and confusing documents and processes; lack of knowledge of available services; unreliable transportation; and fear of using government services. One way to increase health equity among Latinos is to remove these barriers. Rocio Muñoz, community health navigator at Benton County Health Department (BCHD), in partnership with the school district, worked to embed bilingual, bicultural health navigators into elementary schools in Corvallis, Ore. (7.4% Latino), to address these identified barriers. The partnership resulted in a model where health navigators are placed in schools to coordinate with students, parents and teachers regarding students’ health records in order to boost access to health ...
Alma Galvez was sick of seeing a growing number of overweight Latino child patients at her clinic in Minneapolis, Minn. (10.5% Latino population). In her job as a community health worker for St. Mary’s Health Clinics in Minnesota, Galvez was able to pinpoint a big culprit—sugary drinks. Galvez and Shannon Gavin, the organization’s coordinator of family health programs, wanted to reduce sugary drink consumption among Latino child patient and families. So they jumped head-first at the chance to work with state health officials to create a bilingual, culturally relevant campaign to urge Latino families to rethink their drink.
Sugar’s Stranglehold on Latino Health Galvez and Gavin are big players in how St Mary’s Health Clinics serves its large minority and ...
Classic water fountains aren't always accessible or safe for kids. Water Bottle Fountains are filtered water dispensers for easily filling and refilling water bottles. This gives kids much-needed access to safe drinking water throughout the school day. They help keep kids hydrated while saving families money from buying bottled water. They also help the environment by reducing waste. Salud America! wants to help you get Water Bottle Fountains at your school with our custom-for-you Water Bottle Fountain Action Pack with Coaching! Request an Action Pack to get (at no charge to you): Customized, click-to-send emails, graphics and resources
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