It cannot be emphasized enough: kids need to eat healthy, nutritious meals in order for them to succeed academically. There is an indisputable link between nutrition and the development of children’s brains. Despite this importance, many kids go hungry. Kids from low-income families, including a disproportionate number of Latinos, often go without meals at school because the owe money. School lunch debt is a huge issue in cities across the country. A 2016 survey by the School Nutrition Association of 1,000 school meal program operators, about 75% of districts had unpaid student meal debt at the end of the school year. The median amount of debt per district was $2,000, but it can run much higher in large districts. For example, the Oakland Unified School District in Oakland, ...
What is the one thing you want most for kids? Salud America! can customize an "Action Pack” just for you to help you build a case and get supporters for your big idea for a healthy change, whether it’s water bottle fountains, brain breaks, shared use, bullying policies, etc. Action Packs can include: Custom emails to school/district leaders
Custom webpage to build supporters
Custom data and graphics for social media
Custom fact sheets, FAQs and PPTs
See samples Request your customized Action Pack now! Michaeli Smith, the wellness coordinator at Comal ISD in Texas, had a big idea for more water bottle fountains in schools. Water bottle fountains, compared to traditional water fountains, help improve students' access to water in schools be enabling them ...
The classic bully takes a kid's lunch money. But a new type of bully—"school lunch shaming," when a student has no money for lunch to begin with—is on the upswing in schools across the country, CNN reports. This type of "hidden" or "unintentional" bullying greatly affects Latino kids. Latino kids comprise about 1 in 4 of the kids participating in the National School Lunch Program, according to the UnidosUS. "It's the working poor who get screwed," Jill Duban, who heads up a program called Common Threads a school district that helps low-income and homeless families, told CNN. "The lunch ladies are not always nice about it."
Brown bags of shame
Despite the large expansion of free and reduced lunch programs across the country, many kids simply cannot afford to pay $2.35 for ...
Kaiser Permanente wants to empower parents to talk to their kids about mental health. Finding the right ways to talk to your children about mental health is important because as many as 13% of children ages 8 to 15 experience a severe mental disorder at some point while growing up. In fact, many parents are unaware of the warning signs in kids or teens who are dealing with mental health issues. A few signs to look for include substance abuse, social isolation, behavior changes and more. Parents wanting to learn more about mental health like how to assess their child's mental health, and or how to talk to their child in a non-judgmental way about mental health can click here for more information on mental health. These resources are also in Spanish for Latino parents to talk ...
A child needs more than nutritious food and physical activity to be healthy. They need healthy minds, too. But 1 in 5 children today suffer a serious mental illness. Depressive symptoms among Latino youth are especially high, putting them at risk of dropping out of school, using drugs, and suicide. For Mental Health Awareness Month in May, let’s use #SaludTues on May 9, 2017, to share tips and strategies to promote healthy minds and environments for Latino and all kids across the U.S. WHAT: #SaludTues Tweetchat: "Latino Kids and Healthy Minds"
TIME/DATE: 1-2 p.m. ET (Noon-1 p.m. CT), Tuesday, May 9, 2017
WHERE: On Twitter with hashtag #SaludTues
HOST: @SaludToday
CO-HOSTS: Cheryl Aguilar (@cheryl_aguilar); Jesus Rodriguez, MD of Kaiser Permanente ...
Data-driven policy is winning in Santa Monica, Calif. (13.1 %Latino). Santa Monica is committed to improving resident's health by looking at housing, transportation, parks, and youths, thus was one of seven communities to receive the 2016 RWJF Culture of Health Prize. In 2012, Santa Monica developed a Wellbeing Index to measure what was hampering or helping the well-being of residents. “The options we give people really affect their ability to access things that can improve the quality of their lives," Francie Stefan, Santa Monica mobility manager, said to the RWJF. Housing. Santa Monica started improving resident's ability to access to affordable housing decades ago. Santa Monica requires developers to set aside a percentage of newly constructed units for affordable ...
Being the new kid in school is always tough, from finding friends to adapting to new teachers and homes. More than 6.5 million students nationwide are frequently the “new kid,” and studies have shown that Latino, black, and lower-income students have the highest rates of student mobility, which refers to students changing schools during the middle of any given school year for any other reason besides matriculation. Frequently, student mobility is detrimental to children's social and academic development, according to data collected by the University of California, Santa Barbara. Understanding this data can also help put them on a path toward academic achievement. “To be sure, multiple moves are a dangerous signal, but even one move increases the [student’s] risk of not ...
Being the new kid in school is always tough, especially when it happens in the middle of the school year. Finding new friends, adapting to new teachers and rules, adjusting to a new home, all are part of a difficult transition that many kids face. According to figures collected by the University of California, Santa Barbara, more than 6.5 million students nationwide are frequently the “new kid,” and it is frequently detrimental to their social and academic development. More and more studies are being done on student mobility and it suggests that this is a key indicator in identifying vulnerable students. Understanding this data can also ensure that they stay on a path toward academic achievement. “To be sure, multiple moves are a dangerous signal, but even one move ...
In the past 10 years, the Thomas Kelly High School girls’ soccer team has been one of the winningest teams in Chicago but they don’t even have their own field to practice or play on. The school is in Southwest Chicago’s Brighton Park Neighborhood (83% Latino), an area that is burdened by high rates of obesity and physical inactivity due to less access to safe and quality recreational facilities than other parts of Chicago. The Brighton Park Neighborhood Council (BPNC) organized a campaign to renovate Kelly Park, the park adjacent to Kelly High School, to build a turf football/soccer field to make the park safer for students and families.
EMERGENCE
Awareness: Patrick Brosnan, Sara Reschly, and other Brighton Park residents saw how environmental injustice negatively affected the ...
