Cassandra Olier

Due 2/12/2019
H&S 490
Assignment 1- Partners and Organizations Assignment- 50 points.

Please answer the following questions. Strengthen your responses by citing at least one source of
literature to better understand the importance of and strategies for increasing partner participation.

1. Introduction paragraph- Identify your health topic and the corresponding HP 2020 objectives.
Provide a bit of background on your interest in the topic. Be as specific as possible. 5 pts.

My chosen health topic is obesity in adolescence girls in middle school (grades 6th through 8th). This
corresponds with multiple Healthy People 2020 objectives including: Increase the proportion of schools
that do not sell or offer calorically sweetened beverages to students, reduce the proportion of adults who
are obese, reduce the proportion of adolescent aged 12 to 19 years who are considered obese, and
increase the proportion of adolescents who meet current Federal physical activity guidelines for aerobic
physical activity. I am interested in this topic because it is close to home. There are a number of
overweight and obese people in my family and friends. I see how it affects their lives and would like to
learn more about it and ways that I could help. I am specifically interested in the age group of middle
school because I believe this is where adolescents can begin to make lifestyle choices for themselves.

2. Mobilizing Communities-Answer the following. 5 pts.

a. Why it is important to bring people together?

It is important to bring people together because it allows for more voices, perspectives, and ideas to be
brought to the table. According to a recent article, “Working together, through a process that encourages
the exploration of differences, people involved in the partnerships have the potential to break new
ground, challenge accepted wisdom, and discover innovative solutions to problems” (Lasker et al., 2001).
The more input there is for a problem, you are likely to have more output. Not only does bringing people
together gain more inputs, you also gain credibility and community involvement.

b. What do you need to learn from bringing people together?

When brining people together you need to learn about each partners strengths and weaknesses. You
need to know about the resources each partner has access to (including funds, people, spaces, etc.), you
need to learn about why they care about a specific topic (in this case, adolescent obesity in females), and
how much each partner can and wants to be involved.

3. Principles of Collaboration- refer to the ppt for the 8 principles of collaboration. Consider your
topic, discuss 4 of the principles that are most important for your project- discuss how you see
employing this principle in coalition building for your topic. 10 pts.

The four principles of collaboration that I consider to be the most important for my topic is recruiting the
right people, devising preliminary objectives and activities, anticipate necessary resources, and improve
through evaluation. Recruiting the right people is important for any collaboration, however I believe it to
be very important for my health topic. Adolescent obesity in middle school is accompanied often times
with mental illnesses and/or poor self-image, therefore the partners need to be ones that would not
negative impact the girls’ mental health. If an organization was included that is coming from a “fat-
shaming” point of view rather than a health point of view, these girls could be negatively impacted.
Devising preliminary objectives and activities is important for my health topic because it allows the ball to
get rolling. It helps reduce or eliminate confusion, road bumps in the precede process, and
miscommunication. Doing this at the beginning stages also allows for a more careful, inclusive, and
sensitive program. Anticipating necessary resources is important for collaboration because it allows for
effectiveness and efficiency. Knowing what funding, staffing, locations, time, etc. is needed for a plan or
program will allow for less waste and more effective allocation of resources. Improving through
evaluation is important for any collaboration, however with my topic it is very important. I believe it is
important to be looking if the intended outcomes are happening. With this topic it is important to
evaluation how it is affecting these girls’ lives. For example, I want to make sure that bullying is not taking
place because of participation in a program, they are not having a worse self-image as before, and that
the program is still taking a healthy, helpful stance rather than one of fat-shaming.

4. Possible Influential People- Discuss the possible influential people for your topic. 10 pts.
a. Who are they and how they possibly influential?

The people who I foresee being possibly influential for this topic are parents, but more importantly their
school peers and school leaders. Parents are possibly influential because they could either be
encouraging and helpful (e.g. getting their child to the programs’ events, nutrition habits, and after school
habits) or they could be discouraging. I believe even more influential than parents are these girls’ peers
and school leaders. Bullying from peers could be a potential reason for non-participation and the school
leaders need to be aware of this and monitor it.

b. What are ways you can involve them?

I believe it is important to involve parents, peers, and school leaders in a program regarding adolescent
obesity in females grades 6th through 8th. You can involve parents by holding information nights to keep
them updated and having a designated role that they preform in this program. You can involve peers who
do not fit this demographic by incorporating healthy nutrition, play/exercise time, and education in
schools participating in said program.

5. People most affected. Discuss the following. 10pts.

a. Who are some of the people most affected?

The people most affected by this is obese females in grades 6th through 8th. Others significantly affected
by this would be their parents and school leaders and peers if the program was one that affected the
school day.
b. What are some potential barriers to their participation and what strategies could you use
to get them involved? (Look at the literature to best respond to this question- see what
others have done).

Potential barriers for participation from the girls’ it is meant to help would be bullying, poor self-image
and poor self-efficacy, as well as parental discouragement. To help reduce bullying and poor self-image
and self-efficacy, an educational strategy would be beneficial. The education would have to fact based
and focused on improvement of both mental and physical health rather than a focus on fat-shaming. To
get parents and school leaders involved the same educational approach could be beneficial. Providing
transportation and child care for the parents would be another way to potentially get them involved.
 6. Agencies, Organizations, Associations- Identify at least one local, state and national association,
coalition or agencies related to your health topic. 10 pts
a. Provide the name, web link and a short description of the work of one local, one state
and one national organization or coalition related to your health topic. (There may not be
local organizations for some topics).
Local- Panhandle Health District. http://panhandlehealthdistrict.org/community-health/ipan
The Panhandle Health District serves the community in Hayden, Sandpoint, Kellogg, Bonners Ferry, St.
Maries and the surrounding areas. They provide a large variety of services from clinical services, food
safety services, to in-home health. However, they also have a focus on helping prevent obesity in adults
by helping obese children. They have a program called the Idaho Physical Activity and Nutrition Program
that focuses on reversing the growing trends in coronary heart disease, hypertension, stroke, type 2
diabetes, certain types of cancer, and premature death.

State- High Five! https://highfiveidaho.org/about/

High Five is an organization that helps ensure that kids have access to spaces and facilities that
encourage physical activity, smart eating habits and access to healthy foods. High Five! has many
programs that are community based.

National- Child Care Aware of America. http://www.childcareaware.org/

Child Care Aware of America provides training and technical assistance to local and state Child Care
Resource and Referral Agencies. They have online obesity prevention trainings, which I think is important
because it is very accessible.

b. Identify one national professional membership association related to your health topic-
briefly describe the association, membership and conference opportunities.
The National Association of Pediatric Nurse Practitioners Childhood Obesity Special Interest Group is a
national professional membership association related to my health topic. They take applications for
membership through e-mail and mail-in applications. The nurse practitioners that are a member share
and gain knowledge about childhood obesity prevention. Each year in the fall they offer members the
opportunity to apply for Childhood Obesity SIG Scholarly Activity and/or Conference Sponsorship Awards.
 References

Lasker, R., Weiss, E., & Miller, R. (2001). Partnership Synergy: A Practical Framework for Studying
and Strengthening the Collaborative Advantage. The Milbank Quarterly., 79(2), 179-205.