Healthy Eating Alliance of Prince Edward Island

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The School Healthy Eating Toolkit - Introduction

Promoting a healthy school environment which provides access to healthy food choices and nutrition education is an excellent way to help ensure that our children will make healthy choices and do well at school.

We, at the PEI Healthy Eating Alliance, are pleased to share with you the School Healthy Eating Toolkit. The Toolkit is a great source of information that has been prepared to support schools as they prepare to implement the School Healthy Eating Policy. The Toolkit provides schools with resources and materials to assist them in promoting a healthy eating environment. The development of the Toolkit was made possible through financial contribution from the Public Health Agency of Canada, Canadian Diabetes Strategy.

The Toolkit includes the newly adopted Eastern School District School Nutrition Policy (and will include similar policies from the Western School Board and the Commission scolaire de langue française when adopted), as well as some frequently asked questions relating to the policy. Supportive documents such as Fundraising Alternatives, Safe Food Handling, Peanut Alternatives, Microwave Safety, and School Nutrition Program Ideas can be found in the Toolkit.

Also included in the Toolkit are past issues of the Healthy Eating Alliance Newsletters and Healthy Eating Tips, as well as samples of fun resources and lesson plans to help schools engage students in nutrition education.

All materials in the Toolkit can be reproduced and most will be available for download from the Healthy Eating Alliance website. We hope to send out additional information for the Toolkit from time to time, so keep a watch out.

We would like to thank the PEI Department of Health for their generous financial support to the PEI Healthy Eating Alliance.

Let us know what you think of the School Healthy Eating Toolkit. Contact Us Today!

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Healthy EATS (Healthy Eating at School) Project Summary

This toolkit was developed as part of the Healthy EATS Project (short for “Healthy Eating at School”), an initiative of the PEI Healthy Eating Alliance’s School Healthy Eating Policy Working Group. The project took place from January to March 2005. The purpose of the project was to provide support to schools as they make changes to promote healthy eating at school.

The four main objectives of this project were as follows:

1) Develop a “School Healthy Eating Toolkit” meant to provide useful information for schools as they make changes to promote healthy eating. This toolkit has been provided to all Island elementary and consolidated schools in the spring of 2005.

2) Develop “Healthy EatS Newsbites” - a newsletter to inform schools regarding progress in the development and implementation of Healthy Eating Policies in all school boards. Newsbites will provide opportunities for schools to share their success stories and challenges as they implement new healthy eating policies.

3) Facilitate networking and sharing through networking meetings which bring lead schools together to share ideas and provide feedback on the first draft of the Toolkit and Newsbites.

4) Develop and pilot a peer education project in healthy eating: This component of the project involved working with 4 UPEI Foods and Nutrition students and 6 high school students to develop and implement a healthy eating peer education pilot on healthy eating for grades 3/4. We worked closely with Laura Lee Noonan at the Department of Education to develop a training and resource manual called “Food Smart for Life!”. This manual will be used by the Department of Education as part of the Active Healthy School Communities initiative.

Funding for this project was provided by the Public Health Agency of Canada, Canadian Diabetes Strategy, with Dr Jennifer Taylor and Wendy MacDonald (Co-Chair, Healthy Eating Alliance) as co-applicants. The project was housed at the University of Prince Edward Island, Department of Family and Nutritional Sciences, the sponsors for the project.

A special thanks to Mary Acorn, coordinator for the overall project, and Charmaine Campbell, coordinator of the peer education project.

The School Healthy Eating Toolkit was developed by the Healthy EATS (Eating at School) Project - an initiative of the PEI Healthy Eating Alliance. This project was made possible through financial contributions from the Public Health Agency of Canada, Canadian Diabetes Strategy.

The working group that guides the progress of the Healthy Eating at School Project consists of the following partners:

Working Group - Partners

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Acknowledgements

The following individuals and organizations deserve thanks and recognitions for their contirbutions during the development of the School Healthy Eating Toolkit.

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The School Healthy Eating Toolkit Table of Contents

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