Impact

CHILD HEALTH

Children need to be healthy in order to grow and learn. OCPYC-funded programs support child health holistically, recognizing that many different factors contribute to overall health.

In FY 2018-2019, OCPYC’s Growing Up Healthy Initiative worked with seven child care centers to improve and maintain child nutrition, physical activity and outdoor learning environments. Using the Nutrition and Physical Activity Self-Assessment for Child Care (NAPSACC), center directors created and implemented action plans that benefitted 560 children with a healthier child care environment.

Growing Up Healthy trained 88 teachers from 23 child care programs through various workshops on increasing physical activity, improving gardening skills, and using STEM in the classroom and outdoor learning environment. Follow-up technical assistance helped teachers bring their learning into the classroom.

Growing Up Healthy also engaged in the state-wide Farm to Early Care and Education Collaborative, with two child care programs receiving training and support for gardening, introducing local fresh foods on their menus, and helping children and families understand where and how food is grown and how to be healthier eaters as a result.

Through OCPYC’s support of the Chapel Hill Training and Outreach Project’s Assuring Better Child Health and Development (ABCD) Program, training and technical assistance was provided to eleven primary care practices in Orange County to facilitate the identification of children who may benefit from early intervention services.

OCPYC’s support of the Chapel Hill Training and Outreach Project’s KidSCope Hispanic Outreach Program helps provide critical, culturally appropriate evidence-based mental health therapy to Spanish-speaking children ages birth to five and their families in Orange County.

“A mother from Mexico was referred to us due to the distress she experienced in parenting her two-year-old child. When I first met with this mom she would describe ‘normal behaviors’ from her child as ‘misbehaving’ that the child did on purpose.  Services provided to this mom have helped her to understand about child development and have realistic expectations about her child. Most importantly, mom has become aware of how her own upbringing has played a role in her parenting and has made a conscious decision to learn more appropriate ways to parent her child.”

–Sofia Moyano-Kleckner, Chapel Hill Training and Outreach Project’s KidSCope Hispanic Outreach Program

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