Abstract
In the United States, about 12% of households are food-insecure, which can have negative health outcomes for children, including delayed development and early onset of obesity. Although many programs prioritize children, few evidence-based interventions exist for adolescents that address nutrition education. One promising intervention is teaching adolescents how to cook healthy meals. The Los Angeles Trust for Children’s Health partnered with The Los Angeles Neighborhood Land Trust to integrate nutrition education and hands-on cooking demonstrations into an after-school program called the Gardening Apprenticeship Program at a local high school. Designed as a yearlong intervention, the Gardening Apprenticeship Program involves garden-based activities teaching food and environmental justice. Cultivating partnerships with other community-based organizations can help build capacity to pilot and replicate similar programs in other communities in food deserts.
Assessment of Need
In the United States, about 12% of households are food-insecure (Los Angeles County Department of Public Health [LACDPH], 2017), which can have negative health outcomes for children, including delayed development and early onset of obesity. Many nutrition-based programs address obesity; however, more emphasis is needed on both increasing access to healthy foods and supporting healthy eating behaviors. One way to prevent obesity and combat food injustice is to learn how to cook your own healthy meals. For adolescents, one promising approach showed that learning hands-on cooking skills during young adulthood is associated with developing healthy eating behaviors (Fredericks et al., 2020; Utter et al., 2018). A systematic review found that culinary interventions were also associated with improved attitudes, self-efficacy, and healthier eating habits (Utter et al., 2018). Building adolescents’ confidence in cooking while learning the benefits of healthy eating can affect how one chooses to eat, which in turn may combat food injustices and ultimately lead to healthier behaviors.
In Los Angeles County, South Los Angeles residents experience high rates of health disparities. One third of adolescents have obesity—1.5 times higher than in wealthy neighborhoods (LACDPH, 2015). South Los Angeles is also considered a “food desert,” defined as a community with limited access to affordable and nutritious food. Increasing adolescents’ capacity to identify and prepare healthy foods through hands-on cooking classes at school can ultimately improve their health. Home economics classes have generally been declining in secondary education settings, resulting in a missed opportunity for students to learn how to cook. Partnering with community-based organizations is an important strategy to help fill this gap and deliver cooking classes while providing nutrition education that can influence long term health. In this practice note, we highlight successes and lessons learned from implementing an after-school cooking class as a means to address food injustice in South Los Angeles.
Description of Strategy
From 2016 to 2019, the LACDPH funded The Los Angeles Trust for Children’s Health (The L.A. Trust) to support the Champions for Change program. The L.A. Trust partnered with the Los Angeles Neighborhood Land Trust to integrate nutrition education into an after-school program called the Gardening Apprenticeship Program (GAP) at a local high school. Our participants included a group of 12 high school students (8 Hispanic and 4 African American), representing all grade levels. Designed as a yearlong intervention, GAP involves garden-based activities teaching food and environmental justice. The partnership used two strategies: (1) delivering evidence-informed nutrition education and (2) demonstrating how fruits and vegetables can be cooked and prepared.
Using a youth engagement approach, former GAP alumni recruited students through classroom presentations. Program staff met with students for 2 hours bimonthly and taught the preapproved Nourish curriculum for 16 weeks. Nutrition education was designed to increase students’ knowledge of the benefits of fruits and vegetables, awareness of food traditions, and influences that affect food choices. Some lessons included How to Read a Food Label, Rethink Your Drink, and MyPlate; each meeting included participatory cooking demonstrations related to the educational content. Table 1 shows the complete list of program topics.
List of Program Topics and Curriculum
The Nourish Food + Community curriculum. bOrange County Nutrition 5 Series curriculum. cHigh School Lesson Plans and Presentations (Drexel University Nutrition Education Program).
Health educators worked with small groups to prepare recipes such as rainbow pasta and soy chorizo tacos. Our evaluation approach consisted of a preprogram survey to assess knowledge and motivation, and a postprogram survey that also included a space for comments from participants. Students completed an evaluation at the end of the program.
Intended Impact/Outcome
The GAP program is a promising intervention viewed positively by students. The program yielded a 100% participant retention rate, which may be attributed to a high level of participant satisfaction. One student remarked in the evaluation, “The valuable knowledge and experience that I have gained through the GAP Nutrition class was knowing how to cook my own meals, and now I understand how it affects my health by what I eat.”
The pre- and postsurveys used a 5-point Likert-type scale (where 1 was strongly disagree and 5 was strongly agree) and measured student knowledge and motivation to change their behavior toward healthier consumption. The largest gains were seen in student level of understanding on various ways to prepare healthy fruit and vegetable snacks they could enjoy. We assessed a total of 35 items on topics such as how food ads influence what teens eat, how sugar affects their health, and whether they talk with their family about food choices. Future implementations of the GAP program should include a more rigorous evaluation of program components that contribute to positive outcomes.
Participants also shared many positive responses when asked about valuable experiences/knowledge students gained, such as how they learned “ways to cook delicious meals with friends and make it fun,” “the importance of having a balanced diet,” and “how bad processed food really is.”
Successes and Lessons Learned
One major success of the program is the reported increase in student motivation to prepare their own healthy meals and snacks postworkshops. One student shared his eagerness to apply the skills he learned in cooking for himself. Overall, there was improvement in students’ ability to choose healthier food options; students reported preparing meals using recipes that were done together in workshops. Another success was the organic cultivation of a partnership between the Los Angeles Neighborhood Land Trust and The L.A. Trust that led to a more comprehensive nutrition education program.
An unforeseen circumstance affected the program’s budget and ingredients used in cooking demonstrations. Although the plan was to incorporate fresh produce grown by GAP students into the cooking demonstrations, due to weather changes, many of the produce intended for use in workshops were not ready to harvest for consumption and had to instead be purchased.
Implications for Practice
Hasan et al. (2019) found that cooking demonstrations and nutrition education have contributed to long-term, healthier eating habits. Emerging frameworks based on decades of culinary education program implementation and evaluation are also informing culinary and nutrition education across the life span (Fredericks et al., 2020). These life skills–based workshops have the potential to be adapted in schools and expanded to other communities in food deserts to improve healthy eating. In addition, cultivating partnerships with other community-based organizations builds capacity to replicate similar programs in other communities. This practice note illustrates that nutrition education coupled with healthy cooking lessons can make an impact on addressing food injustice by improving students’ ability to choose healthier foods and develop cooking skills in order to prepare healthy meals for themselves and their families.
Footnotes
Authors’ Note:
We are grateful for the partnership with The Los Angeles Neighborhood Land Trust and appreciate the students’ participation in the nutrition education and cooking workshops. Funding for this work was supported by California’s CalFresh Healthy Living Program, with funding from the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program.
