STUDENT INVOLVEMENT IN LOCAL WELLNESS POLICIES OF PENNSYLVANIA LOCAL EDUCATION AGENCIES
Open Access
- Author:
- Jomaa, Lamis Hassan
- Graduate Program:
- Nutrition
- Degree:
- Master of Science
- Document Type:
- Master Thesis
- Date of Defense:
- October 29, 2008
- Committee Members:
- Claudia Kay Probart, Thesis Advisor/Co-Advisor
Claudia Kay Probart, Thesis Advisor/Co-Advisor - Keywords:
- local education agencies
local wellness policies
nutrition school policies
student involvement
Pennsylvania schools - Abstract:
- Childhood obesity is a serious public health problem. The prevalence of obesity has almost tripled in the past three decades among children and adolescents in the US. Thus, preventing childhood obesity has become a national concern that requires better understanding of the ‘obesogenic environment’ in which children live. Researchers and policy makers are addressing school environments as primary settings for preventing childhood obesity. In an attempt to address the problem of childhood obesity, the federal government passed the Child Nutrition and WIC Reauthorization Act of 2004 that mandated each Local Education Agency (LEA) participating in the school meal programs to develop a Local Wellness Policy (LWP) and to involve a number of stakeholders in the development process. Research supports student involvement in nutrition programs and school-based interventions that promote healthy lifestyle behaviors as this may increase buy-in for changes occurring in schools to promote nutrition. In the present study, we investigated student involvement in the development of LWPs and policy goals addressing student involvement. We also explored policy and demographic characteristics of LEAs as predictors of student involvement. LWPs from all traditional LEAs in Pennsylvania (n=721; including 539 public LEAs and 182 private LEAs) were abstracted and analyzed. We observed that LEAs with comprehensive and strong policies were more willing to engage students in nutrition-related policies and activities regardless of their sponsor type (public or private), enrollment, location, and socioeconomic status of their students. In addition, LEAs that met the policy development team membership requirements and have involved students on the wellness committees that developed LWPs were more likely to sustain their participatory approaches and involve students on the ongoing wellness committees that follow-up on the implementation of the LWPs. We also found significant differences between public and private LEAs in half of the student involvement goals explored in our analysis. This is an area in need of further investigation. Future studies are needed to investigate ‘best practices’ for student involvement in LEAs and to explore other predictor variables of student involvement in school nutrition policies. In addition, our field requires further exploration of the impact of student engagement initiatives on the dietary and physical activity behaviors of youth, as well as the potential changes in the knowledge,behaviors, and attitudes of students when actively involved in addressing the challenges and solutions of childhood obesity within the school settings.