Thursday, March 29, 2012

Day 2

Today was helpful in understanding a community needs assessment--which is basically a set of steps related to evaluating the health of a given population. Today was also helpful in strengthening my knowledge of food insecurity. The video clips we watched proved to be very insightful--especially the one about all the people in Southeastern Ohio standing in line for food.

In the past I have volunteered for a similar outreach for my church. The program I helped with was associated with the Freestore Foodbank and provided nutritious food items for those individuals/families that qualified. I always knew that there were people in my home town that needed assistance; but I didn't realize that there were so many until I volunteered.

Wednesday, March 28, 2012

Day 1:

What I hope to learn and what community nutrition is all about:

When I think of "community nutrition" I think of the nutritional/health status of members of a certain group. I also think of the promotion of nutrition/overall wellness over a large audience. From this class I hope to learn about the major health problems that affect the U.S. population and how to treat them nutritionally. I would also like to better understand the factors that influence the food choices as well as those programs available to help meet nutritional needs of members of this population.