Houston Program Turns Schools into Healthy Food Hubs

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To reach families who need better access to healthy fruits and vegetables, sometimes you have to think outside of the box. What if schools became a place where families could pick up fresh food to bring home each week? A program in Houston thinks this idea is worth a shot. Brighter Bites is a new collaborative effort among the Houston Food Bank, Texas Children’s Hospital, KIPP schools and The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston.

The program seeks to improve health by removing barriers to healthy eating. Second-and-third-grade children and their parents at KIPP Explore Academy in Houston’s East End are currently participating in Brighter Bites. The 16-week program includes 50 servings of a variety of produce sent home weekly with parents. The program also includes family taste-testing sessions, nutrition handouts and recipe cards, and the classroom-based, teacher-led CATCH (Coordinated Approach to Child Health) nutrition education. A major point of ACE is to get parents to choose fruits and vegetables and in turn get their kids eating healthier. The healthy eating learned at school, Brighter Bites hopes, will be reinforced at home, especially since the parents have access to the right foods. “It’s very exacting that the students get to have fruits for them, and try new things like salads, fresh fruit” a parent said.

The idea for Brighter Bites began when  Lisa Helfman and her husband  joined a food cooperative. “They participated in a co-op and saw the difference it made to their family and children’s eating habits and wanted to translate it to the community,” says Shreela Sharma, Ph.D., assistant professor at The UT School of Public Health. Sharma says that she jumped on board with the program because she was excited about the idea of combining food access with food literacy. “Our team helped give structure to the idea by identifying that 50 servings of produce per week was sufficient. We also developed the nutrition education components as well as the evaluation of the program to see if it is feasible, acceptable and changes family’s eating habits,” she said.

Because the program is 18 weeks, the team hopes that the kids as well as the parents will begin to form healthy habits that will stay with them. “We do know that it takes kids up to 12 times of trying a new food before they actually know if they like it or don’t like it” explained Katherine Albus, a graduate assistant behind the program. There is already talk about extending the program. Brighter Bites and programs like it are excellent pathways that can lead to policy change, like a permanent fresh food co-op housed at school, or healthier food offerings during school time. When community members come together, meaningful change happens.