Please (Like) "Save the Integrated Nutrition Education Program" on Facebook.
The Integrated Nutrition Education Program (INEP) has been funded by the USDA food Stamp Nutrition Education Program.
INEP goals are to instill life-long nutrition behaviors to prevent obesity, type 2 diabetes, cancer and heart disease; by targeting increased fruit and vegetable consumption, overall healthy eating, increased physical activity and children's willingness to try new foods.
INEP is a 6 year program consisting of 24 hands-on lessons each year, involving food preparation and eating with links to science and literacy standards in the classroom. The program also offers nutrition education for the entire family through newsletters, parent classes, and parent nights.
The program evaluation has show significant behavior changes in children, compared to control schools. Teachers are positive about the program and continue to teach the lessons year after year.
Our funding flows from the USDA through the Colorado Department of Human Services (CDHS) to CSU then to INEP. CDHS has decided that school-based classroom programming (i.e. nutrition education reaching children as the primary audience) will be eliminated from the Colorado plan.
· This impacts 21 School Districts, 106 low-income schools, 1284 teachers will no longer be supported in teaching nutrition in the classroom.
· Approximately 37,500 low-income students through-out the state will no longer receive 34 hands-on nutrition lessons per school year.
· 37,500 low-income parents and families, many who are Hispanic, will no longer receive multiple nutrition education strategies.
· The State of Colorado will lose a documented research and evidence-based nutrition education program with a successful 17-year history in multiple Colorado communities.
· Colorado Department of Education will lose its partnership resulting in consistent and high quality nutrition education being provided to over 100 low-income schools, 37,000 children, 37,000 families.
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