HSN708 Nutrition Promotion: Program Plan for Bendigo Council, 2018

This assignment presents a nutrition promotion program plan developed for Bendigo Council, addressing poor food consumption among young people. It includes a cover letter introducing the Health Promotion Officer and proposing a partnership with a local school to implement a healthy eating ...Read More

Name:
Course
Professor’s name
University name
City, State
Date of submission

Name
Melbourne Local Council
324-75 melbourne
MR X
School principal
Melbourne high
36 Melbourne
Dear Mr X:
I wish to take this opportunity to formally introduce myself as the health promotion officer of
Melbourne council. I recently graduated from Deakin University with a Masters in Nutrition and
am humbled to be working around here.
The Melbourne council has over time identified the poor food consumption of young people I the
society as well as in the school. In view of this the council would like to partner with you in

developing a healthy eating program that will be of assistance to the young people. Poor food
consumption has a lot of negative effects on the adolescents and thus it is our duty to ensure that
we develop for them better eating programs. I am also made to understand that the problem of
poor food consumption has been a major concern for you in the school and thus it would be
important if we can come together for this noble cause.
A healthy eating program is important for the community in several ways. We will be able to
have young and energetic people who can perform various tasks in the society. Also a proper
food program will assist in the prevention of various diseases that are usually associated with
poor food consumption. This would in turn translate to a healthy society.
Therefore it is my sincere hope that you will get back to us so that we can arrange an appropriate
time for us to discuss further on this matter.
Sincerely,
Name
Health Promotion Officer

Program plan
Introduction
A program plan is a formulation of steps that will be used in ensuring that a specific program is
implemented accordingly. Program plan are used when there is a matter that is not going as
expected and thus it requires a program plan to be formulated. In terms of nutrition, there are
several areas in which proper nutrition is not observed by the whole population or by a particular
group of people.1 The lack of proper nutrition exposes the said people to diseases and deaths and
thus it is something that should be taken with the seriousness that it deserves. In or case, the local
school is faced with the problem of poor food consumption and this has necessitated the need for
the formulation of a program plan. This plan is expected to develop a better eating program for
the young people and also teach them other important aspects of a good nutrition.2
Objectives
The main objective of this program plan is to ensure that the students adopt better eating habits
that will assist them in their growth. The program plan will take them through the whole
nutrition details so that they can clearly understand the importance of observing good food
consumption. They will be able to learn of the dangers of poor food consumption not only to
themselves but to the society at large. Also by the end of the implementation of this plan, they
should have been able to fully understand and start observing the good eating habits3
1 Douglas CC, Camel SP. Utilization of a Near-Peer Nutrition Education Program for Undergraduates.
Journal of Nutrition Education and Behavior. 2018 Jul 1;50(7):S168-9.
2 Edelman, C.L., Mandle, C.L. and Kudzma, E.C., 2017. Health Promotion Throughout the Life Span-E-
Book. Elsevier Health Sciences.
3 Eke H. The health promotion center A business plan. California State University, Long Beach; 2017.

Strategies
The program plan will employ the use of various strategies in order to ensure that the plan is well
adopted and is also successful.
Education sessions
This is one of the strategies that will be used in trying to deal with the poor food consumption.
Education is an important tool as it empowers the young people in to knowing what is right and
wrong.4 There is the need to teach the students the advantages of a good and healthy eating
program rather than just expecting them to conform to it without first understanding what it
entails. Therefore the need for a healthy eating program should be emphasized in the school
curriculum so that the learners can constantly be taught about the issue.it is important to note that
the students themselves have observed that the school environment in which they are in does not
convey the message of good food consumption that they learn from their classes. 5Due to this we
are going to ensure that we create an environment that encompasses whatever is taught in the
classroom so that the students can be able to relate to whatever they learn.
Also, there is a complaint by one of the teachers who are tasked with teaching nutrition matters
in the school regarding time. The time that is allocated for the students to be taught nutrition is
much way shorter as compared to other subjects that are viewed to be of more importance than
4 Gray VB, Galvan C, Donlin A. The Integration of Service‐Learning Research into a Community Nutrition
Course. Family and Consumer Sciences Research Journal. 2017 Mar;45(3):257-71.
5 Hall E, Chai W, Koszewski W, Albrecht J. Development and validation of a social cognitive theory-based
survey for elementary nutrition education program. International Journal of Behavioral Nutrition and
Physical Activity. 2015 Dec;12(1):47.

nutrition. This has led to the teacher only giving the students an overview rather than an in depth
of nutrition and good food consumption. Therefore we will sit down with the relevant people and
see how best we can allocate more time so as to enable these students to be educated more on the
issue of a healthy eating program which will in turn lead to a proper growth of the society.6
Furthermore, the number of students taking the short course of home economics is fewer as
compared to other courses. This can be attributed to the students having no interest in the subject
as the view it as having no meaningful impact in their life. This is however not the case.t is upon
us to ensure that we have educated the students on the importance of a healthy eating program in
their day to day lives so that they can be able to understand how it always affects them. 7We will
encourage the students to enroll more on this course so as to gain knowledge that they can use
for themselves and also they can teach other members of the society.
To add to this ,a recent survey has indicated that most of the parents believe that teaching of
nutritional knowledge and skills in schools is critical in trying to achieve and develop a healthy
eating program.8It is therefore their feeling that more time should be allocated in schools for such
skills to be taught to the students. Thus we will strive to make deliberations with the school
heads in order for them to understand the importance of this.
Workshops
6 Issel LM, Wells R. Health program planning and evaluation. Jones & Bartlett Learning; 2017 Aug 4.
7 Levin SM, Barnard ND, Saltalamacchia RE. A proposal for improvements in the Supplemental Nutrition
Assistance Program. American journal of preventive medicine. 2017 Feb 1;52(2):S186-92.
8 McGuirt JT, Pitts SB, Seguin RA, Bentley M, DeMarco M, Ammerman AS. Perspectives on a local food
access and nutrition education program from Cooperative Extension nutrition educators. Journal of
Agriculture, Food Systems, and Community Development. 2018 Aug 28;8(3):1-8.

The program will also engage the use of workshops in trying to achieve good food consumption
for both the students and the surrounding community.
The school has a canteen in which the staffs there have a bit of training on food safety but lack
training on health promotion. The staffs are ready and willing to lean more on the health
promotion and proper food consumption. Thus as part of our strategy we will take advantage of
this to ensure that we organize workshops for all nutrition stakeholders. 9The staff will be taught
on the best ways of health promotion and on serving good food that entail all nutrients. This will
ensure that as they move about their duties they will be mindful of whatever they have learned in
regard to good food consumption and thus the chances of the program being successfully
implemented will be high. They will move from the notion of only getting profits to that of
ensuring that the clients get the best nutrition from the food that they purchase.10
Seminars
The use of seminars is also an important thing although this may not be very convenient in the
school set up. However it is good to note that the school has not had any promotional activities
for the last 5 years.in view of this we can organize a seminar in which health nutrition activities
can be promoted by various stakeholders. This will go a long way in ensuring that people are
aware of the need to observe good food consumption habits and thus help the students and the
community. 11
9 Misyak S, Culhane J, McConnell K, Serrano E. Assessment for learning: Integration of assessment in a
nutrition course with a service-learning component. NACTA Journal. 2016 Dec 1;60(4).
10 Polan EU, Taylor DR. Journey across the life span: Human development and health promotion. FA
Davis; 2019 Jan 16.
11 Ridgway EM, Lawrence MA, Woods J. Integrating environmental sustainability considerations into food
and nutrition policies: insights from Australia’s National Food Plan. Frontiers in nutrition. 2015 Sep

Timeline
This program will start from 2019 to 2021.This period will be sufficient enough to enable us
undertake the planning, implementation and evaluation of the program with a view to ensure that
the strategies used are efficient. 12We will also establish a team of members that will be in charge
of monitoring and advising the relevant stakeholders of the progress of the program and any
other matter that may arise as the program is being implemented.
Stakeholder engagement
The key stakeholders that are involved in this program include the school principal, council
members, teachers, students and the community. Most of the stakeholders will be engaged in
almost all of the strategies that will be used and thus are very important to the program. The
council staff will mainly be tasked with the facilitation of training programs that will be
undertaken during the period for the program. They may also be engaged in meetings together
with their counterparts in school as they seek to strategize on the best possible way of handling
the program13
The students will also be encouraged to bring forward their views in order for it to be
accommodated in the program together with that of the local community. Issues such as change
17;2:29.
12 Sanjeevi N, Freeland-Graves JH. Food Purchasing Patterns of Supplemental Nutrition Assistance
Program (SNAP) Participants. The FASEB Journal. 2016 Apr;30(1_supplement):900-1.
13 Sharma SV, Hedberg AM, Skala KA, Chuang RJ, Lewis T. Feasibility and acceptability of a gardening-
based nutrition education program in preschoolers from low-income, minority populations. Journal of Early
Childhood Research. 2015 Feb;13(1):93-110.

of food will be tackled in the planning stages while the monitoring of the uptake of the new food
consumption will be handled as the program is going on. We will also ensure that we set out
back up measures in case we run into unexpected challenges when implementing the program.
Evaluation and Dissemination
We will have to carry out a thorough evaluation of the program in order to ensure that the desired
objectives have been achieved. We will do an internal review of the education policies that we
proposed and implemented and compare them with the actual results that we will have achieved.
This is important in measuring the % in which the program has been successful and the areas that
may need improvement in the future. 14The workshops and seminars that were used will also be
audited to check whether the information passed during the time of these events had a successful
impact or not. This can be done by collecting data of the number of people who attended as
compared to the total population expected and whether those people have had a change in their
food consumption.
Future program use
The program is user friendly and one that is easily adaptable by various stakeholders. The
success of this program will go a long way in determining whether it can be used in other
settings that may be similar to the topic here in question.in the case that the program is adopted,
it would only need minimum modification before it can be used
14 Soule K, Klisch S, Linnell JD, Scherr RE, Bergman JJ, Ginsburg DC, Zidenberg-Cherr S. Schools as
Hubs of Health: A Case Study on Comprehensive Nutrition Education Program Delivery. Journal of
Nutrition Education and Behavior. 2016 Jul 1;48(7):S31.

References
1) Douglas CC, Camel SP. Utilization of a Near-Peer Nutrition Education Program for
Undergraduates. Journal of Nutrition Education and Behavior. 2018 Jul 1;50(7):S168-9.
2) Edelman, C.L., Mandle, C.L. and Kudzma, E.C., 2017. Health Promotion Throughout
the Life Span-E-Book. Elsevier Health Sciences.
3) Eke H. The health promotion center A business plan. California State University, Long
Beach; 2017.

4) Gray VB, Galvan C, Donlin A. The Integration of Service‐Learning Research into a
Community Nutrition Course. Family and Consumer Sciences Research Journal. 2017
Mar;45(3):257-71.
5) Hall E, Chai W, Koszewski W, Albrecht J. Development and validation of a social
cognitive theory-based survey for elementary nutrition education program. International
Journal of Behavioral Nutrition and Physical Activity. 2015 Dec;12(1):47.
6) Issel LM, Wells R. Health program planning and evaluation. Jones & Bartlett Learning;
2017 Aug 4.
7) Levin SM, Barnard ND, Saltalamacchia RE. A proposal for improvements in the
Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program. American journal of preventive medicine.
2017 Feb 1;52(2):S186-92.
8) McGuirt JT, Pitts SB, Seguin RA, Bentley M, DeMarco M, Ammerman AS. Perspectives
on a local food access and nutrition education program from Cooperative Extension
nutrition educators. Journal of Agriculture, Food Systems, and Community Development.
2018 Aug 28;8(3):1-8.
9) Misyak S, Culhane J, McConnell K, Serrano E. Assessment for learning: Integration of
assessment in a nutrition course with a service-learning component. NACTA Journal.
2016 Dec 1;60(4).
10) Polan EU, Taylor DR. Journey across the life span: Human development and health
promotion. FA Davis; 2019 Jan 16.
11) Ridgway EM, Lawrence MA, Woods J. Integrating environmental sustainability
considerations into food and nutrition policies: insights from Australia’s National Food
Plan. Frontiers in nutrition. 2015 Sep 17;2:29.

12) Sanjeevi N, Freeland-Graves JH. Food Purchasing Patterns of Supplemental Nutrition
Assistance Program (SNAP) Participants. The FASEB Journal. 2016
Apr;30(1_supplement):900-1.
13) Sharma SV, Hedberg AM, Skala KA, Chuang RJ, Lewis T. Feasibility and acceptability
of a gardening-based nutrition education program in preschoolers from low-income,
minority populations. Journal of Early Childhood Research. 2015 Feb;13(1):93-110.
14) Soule K, Klisch S, Linnell JD, Scherr RE, Bergman JJ, Ginsburg DC, Zidenberg-Cherr S.
Schools as Hubs of Health: A Case Study on Comprehensive Nutrition Education
Program Delivery. Journal of Nutrition Education and Behavior. 2016 Jul 1;48(7):S31.