Project Summary: Got veggies? Research: The Healthy Hunger Free Kids Act of 2010 made fruits and vegetables a mandatory addition to each student’s school meal. While Anoka-Hennepin Schools offers students as many fruits and vegetables as they care to eat, when it became mandatory, the Anoka-Hennepin Schools child nutrition department saw more fruits and vegetables on trays, but also significantly more that went uneaten – which provided no nutritional value.
The percentage of children with obesity in the United States has more than tripled since the 1970s (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention - CDC); and children consume up to 50 percent of their daily calories and nutrients at school (Alliance for a Healthier Generation). The Anoka-Hennepin Schools child nutrition department began meeting with the school district wellness coordinator and the communications team to brainstorm ways to engage students in the school cafeterias, and inspire them to make healthy choices at an early age to instill healthy habits for life. Analysis: Our schools are an excellent place to teach our students about health and wellness. Students learn more than just academics in school. They also learn about health, wellness and how food fuels their bodies to help them learn and grow. Students don’t just learn this through lesson plans – but also through role modeling and observing what is served every day for breakfast, snack and at lunch.
The school district wellness coordinator and the communications team conducted focus groups with student leaders involved in athletics, theater, debate and extracurricular activities at one of the district high schools to better understand how to reach their peers and younger students in the school district. The communications team learned that in order to reach our students, we needed to find a way to speak to them in a way that they wanted to be spoken to. Younger students look up to and aspire to be the student leaders they see in their school communities. Communication: The communications team developed a “got veggies?” educational wellness campaign with the help of the school district wellness coordinator and high school students. Through the work conducted in the focus groups, high school students helped staff draft catchy phrases and posed for photos to be used on posters reminiscent of the famous “got milk?” ad campaign launched in the 90s. Those student leaders became the stars of a new poster campaign, unique to AnokaHennepin Schools: “got veggies?” The posters were hung in the cafeterias of the high school and the six elementary and middle schools that “feed” into that high school.
The school district wellness coordinator pitched the role modeling idea to the Hennepin County Statewide Health Improvement Program (SHIP), and grant dollars through the program brought the “got veggies?” campaign to life. The campaign was comprised of ten poster designs. Each participating school received one set of posters. The day that the posters were unveiled in school cafeterias, the same high school student leaders who helped develop the campaign served up vegetables to elementary and middle school students in the cafeteria lunch line while sporting “got veggies?” t-shirts. The high school students also sat with their younger peers during lunch for conversation about whether or not they “got veggies?” on their plate, which vegetables were their favorite to eat, and the importance of making healthy choices. In addition, high school students passed out samples of a new broccoli salad for elementary and middle school students to taste test. The poster graphics have been posted on participating school Facebook pages since the campaign launch, with the intention of inspiring the conversation to continue at home and in our school communities. Evaluation: “Got veggies?” was a pilot program launched in one-fifth of the schools in the school district in the fall of 2016. Child nutrition staff have struggled to find a way to measure the consumption of vegetables, but school principals and the child nutrition staff in each school have reported that they are witnessing more enthusiasm from students in regard to menu choices and wanting to make healthy choices during lunch. The response from school staff and students was so positive that two other high schools have requested to roll out their own school-specific campaign, featuring their own student leaders. The communications team is currently working with high school students at those schools and plan to roll those campaigns out in fall 2017.