Leena Eats, Gourmet Communication ... Food, Travel, Gastronomy

This week’s Gastro Friday post is by an old college pal of mine, Marianne LeGreco, Assistant Professor in Health Communication at the University of North Carolina–Greensboro. Marianne is a passionate supporter of healthy school food programs, something you might remember me talking about in the past. Hope you enjoy the first official guest post on Leena Eats ever!! ******************************************** Author?s Note: I?ve known Leena for a long, long time ? over 10 years ? and I?m delighted to be invited as a contributor to her food blog. As someone who spends most of her time doing academic writing, I believe that blogs are an excellent way for us ivory-tower types to translate our research and service projects into more accessible and conversational writing. I hope that you enjoy the first of what I hope to be many guest spots for LeenaEats. ******************************************** As someone who studies Communication, I find it fascinating to talk about food. My day job as an Assistant Professor in Health Communication lets me talk about the relationship between food policy and nutrition practice, healthy eating on a budget, and ways to improve access to fresh and local foods. But occasionally, I also get the chance to take my skills as a ?food speaker? into the community. Recently, my service work gave me the opportunity to host a series of nutrition seminars for sophomores at a low-performing high school where I live. What follows is a tale about my work with these students, which was an experience that made all of us think differently about our food choices. One of the biggest challenges that I face as someone who both researches food and talks about food in her community is translating complex health policy information into more user-friendly messages. It is a challenge that I often welcome, because I believe that most people want to make more informed food choices. They want to use the policy-based resources like the Dietary Guidelines for Americans and MyPyramid, which are offered by organizations like the USDA and the Department of Health and Human Services. However, most people are so overwhelmed by the amount of food, nutrition, and obesity information out there, so they sidestep the conversation altogether. The challenges of translating policy into practice became even more apparent when I started working with sophomores at a local high school in my community. At first, these students were very resistant to the notion of eating a few more fruits and vegetables. As we dug a little deeper ? mostly through classroom discussions ? I found out some of the reasons why. First of all, the students lacked basic knowledge about nutrition practices. Sure, they knew about basic food groups and the Food Pyramid. At the same time, they did not know how to use these resources in order to make informed decisions. Second, many of the students felt like they had little control over their own food choices. Mom, Dad, Grandma, or Grandpa were usually in charge of the meal planning at home, and most of them cooked in the good old Southern tradition of butter, lard, and bacon fat. Also, many students noted that their choices at school were not very appealing ? saying that the menu rotated only between pizza and tacos. Finally, they were less than thrilled about the idea of a community garden or Edible Schoolyard, primarily because they were afraid that someone in their resource-deprived neighborhood would destroy it or steal from it. I was particularly impressed with the ways that students opened up about these topics and expressed real concerns about the process of eating healthier. As our seminars progressed, I saw the students continue to open up to the possibility of finding ways to eat a few more fruits and vegetables. The most significant turning point came when I asked students to design refrigerator magnets with images and slogans about eating healthier. I had some funds to make one magnet that would be used for my future health service work, so I decided to have a little competition among these sophomores. They were immediately engaged by the activity ? in part because of the competition, but also because they got a chance to be creative about food. In the beginning, I told students that the best design would be turned into an actual magnet, but in the end we combined three designs together to produce the winning image. The magnet features some drawings of fruits and vegetables by two different students alongside a slogan developed by a third student that said ?Vegetables and Fruits are the Stems to Our Roots.? I thought the slogan was especially poignant, because it captured many of the conversations that our group had about food and nutrition practices. Over the course of the seminars, these students started to see how fruits and vegetables were not only a good foundation for their everyday diets, but these foods also connected them to their larger cultural ?roots.? By the end of our time together, I even got them to warm up to the idea of starting that Edible Schoolyard. Based on my time with these sophomores, I came away with several lessons about turning policy initiatives into more user-friendly messages. Most notably, I learned that when we translate complex health policy information into usable practices, people need to have a meaningful experience that will connect them to the topic. This meaningful experience can be sharing a special meal with family and friends, reading a particularly insightful food blog, or simply designing a magnet for a classroom exercise. As people who write and speak about food, this lesson is definitely something that we can all carry with us. ***