1. Improving Food Access in Prince
George’s ‘Food Desert’
Through education and
community involvement
Group 1:
Ayla Cash, Heba Elnaiem, Eliza Mette, Dexter Thomas
Group 2:
Maddie Epping, Johnetta Saygbe, Brian Smith, Alec Walker
http://bit.ly/1fAx5s3
2. Introduction:
Food Deserts
• Hard to find nutritious,
affordable food
• Poverty and poor health
reinforce one another
• USDA identified 10 food
deserts in prince George’s
County, including Capitol
Heights
http://bit.ly/1k2qybV
4. Community Contact
• Met with Town Hall administrators
• Led to potential projects:
1. Community education initiative at Capitol
Heights ES
2. “Got Hope” & food distribution
• Wrap-up with community block party
5. Group 1:
Garden-Grown Food Redistribution
• Made contact with Got Hope
• Began to assess specific
needs:
– Food storage problem
• Have consistent food supply,
but going to waste without
anywhere to store it
– Unable to afford 501(c)(3) fee
6. Group 2:
Community Education Initiative
• PTA and teacher contact at Capitol
Heights ES
• “Healthy Eating and Urban
Farming” curriculum
• Lack of response or interest from
school
• Shift in educational outreach efforts
to seniors
http://bit.ly/1mI8K8O
7. Project Evolution & Merge
• Concern about long-term impact
• Decision to merge and delegate tasks to
individuals and smaller sub-groups
• Working in direct response to community vs.
our initial objectives
9. Result 1:
Healthy Living Booklet
"What information would encourage individuals
to buy healthier foods? Is it recipes with prices,
information on how to get to the grocery store, or
information on the benefits of eating healthy?“
All of these things would be helpful. Basically, a
guide with clear-cut info on how to make eating
healthy easy is what the goal should be, and this
info would greatly contribute to that.
– Ms. Payne, Got Hope
10.
11.
12. Result 2:
Senior Healthful Eating Workshop
• Affordability of Healthy Food (5
min presentation)
• Small group activities
– Sugar savvy, disease risk, nutrition
needs
• Food preparation in small groups
– Everlasting Life samples
• Wrap-up, followed by Q&A
14. Result 4:
Unity in the Community
• Booklet distributed alongside
Got Hope food baskets
• 60+ bags of groceries
distributed
• Education
– Booklets
– PCRM materials
– Networking
15. Summary of Results
1. Healthy Living Booklet
2. Fundraiser & 501(c)(3)
3. Healthy Living Workshop
4. Unity in the Community
16. Conclusions
• Importance of working with community
• Being aware of limitations and time restraints
• Experience was positive and enriching
• Planted seeds for long-term impact
http://bit.ly/1ffpxA5
17. • Reschedule Healthful Eating Workshop
• Table at 1st Annual Capitol Heights Day
• Got Hope
– 501(c)(3) status
– Bank account
– Networking
http://bit.ly/1mI9HxD
Editor's Notes
Hello, and thank you for attending our presentation on.. Blah blah blah.
[Ayla]
We have referred to food deserts in the Academy before, but just to make sure everyone is on the same page, a food desert is defined by the USDA as parts of the country void of fresh fruit, vegetables, and other healthful whole foods. These are usually found in impoverished areas, largely due to a lack of grocery stores, farmers’ markets, and healthy food providers.
This has become a big problem because while food deserts are often short on whole food providers, especially fresh fruits and vegetables, instead, they are heavy on local quickie marts that provide a wealth of processed, sugar, and fat laden foods that are known contributors to a number of diet-related health problems. The food desert problem has in fact become such an issue that the USDA has outlined a map of our nation’s food deserts. Worse, of the few supermarkets in these struggling areas, few accept Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) payments. Poverty and poor health thus reinforce one another in a vicious cycle of dependency. In July, the USDA identified 10 food deserts in Prince George’s County, including Capitol Heights, Maryland.
[Ayla]
We decided to specifically focus on Capitol Heights after reading an article in the Washington Post about the area and attempts from community residents to address it via a vegan food truck. We learned that in Capitol Heights, 70% of adults are obese or overweight and 71% of restaurants are fast-food outlets. Further, many residents battle with ailments that can be related to diet, such as high blood pressure, high cholesterol, gout, and heart disease.
Now that we had a specific area in mind that we have realistic access to, we started to brainstorm about how to actually address the issue. We initially decided to start a local community garden, but discovered that the Town Hall of Capitol Heights already had one. And this led to our first contacts in the community.
[Johnetta]
Group representatives headed down to Capitol Heights to meet with a couple of the Town Hall administrators and to take a tour of the community garden. We were also referred to two additional community contacts – an interested teacher at Capitol Heights Elementary School and Got Hope, a group of community residents who take it upon themselves to redistribute fruit and vegetables to senior citizens in the area.
After forming specific objectives, we separated into two sub-groups – one to focus on education, starting with putting together a curriculum with the teacher at the elementary school oriented around healthy eating and urban farming. And another to work with Got Hope in order to distribute food grown in the community garden.
We then put together an agenda and a timeline, and began to meet in these separate sub-groups with one bi-monthly umbrella meeting to touch base with one another. Our ultimate goal being to unite again in the end via a community block party, which meant that group representatives would continue to meet with administrators to plan this.
[Johnetta]
The first group made contact with Got Hope and began to assess their specific needs and form realistic objectives, including using the community grown produce as primary food supply for distribution.
However, after eliciting specific feedback from Got Hope, we discovered that they already have a consistent food supply – so much, in fact, that they don’t have sufficient storage space. Got Hope expressed that they were in need of a large storage space, as much of their food was going to waste simply due to an inability to store it. They also expressed wanting to become incorporated as a 501(c)(3) non-profit group, but had not been able to afford the $850 fee needed to do so. Yet, being a non-profit would make it easier to elicit donations, utilize community resources, and potentially even secure better storage space in the long-run.
[Eliza]
And the second group started to work on a mini-curriculum titled “Healthy Eating and Urban Farming” for the youth. The goal being to work with a teacher to implement a sustainable curriculum.
Unfortunately, making contact was a lot more difficult than we had anticipated. After we got a hold of the principal, she expressed enthusiasm and interest. (Eliza briefly summarize story here), then lead to:
… after a lack of response from the elementary school, we shifted our educational outreach efforts. We learned through the Town Hall and Got Hope that they were concerned about neglecting senior citizens in the community, who have extremely limited mobility and resources.
[Eliza]
Given what we had learned from the community, members overall expressed concern about having a long-term impact. We decided that education could encompass more than increasing awareness of the community garden – but to other resources in the community, such as Got Hope and healthy eating resources overall. And now, by actually working WITH and in direct response to the community, to shift our focus on how to make Got Hope more successful so they can continue to grow and address this issue in our absence.
After extensive contact with and in response to the community, we decided to shift away from community garden awareness and to merge in order to be the more efficient. Instead of two sub-groups, tasks were then delegated to individuals and smaller sub-groups in order to most efficiently accomplish our more informed objectives. And this led to four sub-projects.
[Alec]
For instance, community residents involved in Got Hope expressed a need for community-specific nutrition information, especially for the senior community. In an interview with the group, one of the residents, Ms.Payne, specifically requested a guidebook.
Alec show cover page – keep this brief. Just, “This is the cover, blah blah…”
[Alec – keep brief also, just an example page]
We pulled a few specific ideas from this interview. Since Got Hope supplies fruits and veggies to the community, we designed the "What you might find in your basket..." section to give people ideas of why these foods are beneficial to their health and simple ideas for how to prepare them.
[Heba]
Other members started to work with a town hall administrator to create a healthful eating workshop appropriate for senior citizens. The town hall would host and advertise the event, and we were in charge of actually designing and implementing the event.
We initially designed a series of presentations in response to topics presented to us from the Town Hall – but later learned that this was a misunderstanding and that they preferred fun, hands-on activities. In response to this, we created a detailed agenda for the event with a much smaller, 5 minute presentation. Then to break up into smaller, interactive groups. Given that the kitchen in town hall does not have any way to cook food, we put together raw meal preparation activities (bean salad, kale salad, guac) from ingredients that they could get from Got Hope or the community garden. We received educational materials, such as a nutrition rainbow, from a local group called the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine. And we also received an agreement from a local vegan restaurant, Everlasting Life, to provide prepared food donations and menus.
[Eliza]
To raise money for the filing fee to get Got Hope 501(c)(3) non-profit status, we also made contact with a local venue, BlackFinn, who agreed to host the fundraiser. Our objective was to raise the $850 needed to get Got Hope non-profit status. If the funds exceeded this amount, we decided that after incorporation, Got Hope will open an official bank account and we will deposit funds into this bank account.
Many of us asked for donations from our family, made this poster and distributed it far and wide, drafted a donation letter template to and assigned local businesses to each team member to solicit for donations, announced the event on (list-serv?), and…
[Brian]
And after speaking extensively about doing a community block party with the town hall, while we initially planned something smaller that would include events such as tomato sandwich making, some music, etc., it ultimately culminated in the town hall organizing the first-ever Capitol Heights community festival – Unity in the Community – with our participation. This was another venue for educational efforts, raising awareness about local resources (e.g. community garden, the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine, Got Hope, and Everlasting Life).
[Brian]
In sum, the healthy living booklet was successfully completed and distributed at the UiC event. It will also be distributed at the first annual Capitol Heights Day festival in June. Got Hope has it, also, and intends to continue distributing it.
The fundraiser was also successful – X amount was raised in total, and Got Hope is in the process of achieving 501(c)(3) status. Once they create a bank account, the remainder will be deposited.
The healthy eating workshop was successfully finalized, but the event has been postponed due to the town hall administrator fearing that there would be a low turnout at that time. We do intend to reschedule it, especially now that the weather is nicer.
And the community festival, Unity in the Community, was also a success. The Healthy Living booklet was distributed alongside other educational materials from PCRM and Got Hope’s food baskets. Many community members stopped by, received fresh fruits and veggies, and expressed considerable interest in working healthy eating and exercise into their lifestyle.
[Maddie]
As complete outsiders initially, we had a very surface understanding of the complexity of the issue and didn’t quite know how to realistically address it. This required making contact with the community, networking, asking questions, and actually responding to the needs of the community. But this also required adapting.
We were all very concerned with having the greatest impact possible – one that would persist in our absence. And deciding on how to do this most efficiently was no easy task. We had conflicting schedules, issues with miscommunication, and so on.
In the end, while there is much more we would like to accomplish, this experience has been a very positive and enriching one that will inform our approach to community projects in the future. And it is our hope that we truly have planted seeds that have set in motion a long-term impact that will persist in our absence.
[Maddie]
We intend to continue our educational efforts in the community, including rescheduling the Senior Outreach Event and tabling at the 1st annual Capitol Heights Day festival in June. We will also continue distribution of the Healthy Living Booklet, PCRM educational materials, and Everlasting Life menus at these events. And we have provided the booklet to Got Hope, who will continue to use it in the community.
