Wapole school nurses: Agents of enduring change

Walpole Massachusetts Public Schools has a vibrant Wellness Committee, a Coalition for Alcohol and Drug Awareness, Let's Move Walpole and a history of working collaboratively with community partners on health issues. As Walpole's students age, the percent of students in the obese range increases. Our goal is to decrease the rate of obesity to 6% from 17.9%, the rate it was a generation ago. A new School Nutrition Food Director shared the school nurses vision for healthier foods for the district's children and presented an opprtunity. This presentation will describe the process that was learned at the Summer School Health Institute for bringing about Enduring Change. The steps taken for creating a school community garden began with an in-depth needs assessment, team building with school and community health partners, development of a time line, implementation of the change project and evaluation. Descriptions of the community based partnerships and the challenges faced as well as the successes will be shared. The Summer School Health Program equips school nurses to be effective agents of change provides a model for similar programming with public health nurses and community health champions.