Page Contents
Overview
TBC School Food Ambassadors have been effectively utilized as partners with school food service to co-develop new school menu items and promote them with demos and sampling. This active collaborative creates peer-driven motivation for more students to participate in school lunch and breakfast, which is easily measured through school food service participation rates.
Target Behavior: Healthy Eating, Physical Activity and Reducing Screen Time, Food Insecurity/Food Assistance
Intervention Type: Direct Education, PSE Change
Intervention Reach and Adoption
Setting: Community gardens, School gardens, Community (Live), Faith-based community, Health care, Indian Tribal Organizations, Retail (Shop/Eat), School (Learn), USDA program sites (not National School Lunch Program)
Target Audience: Middle School, High School
Race/Ethnicity: All
Intervention Components
Intervention Materials
- Curriculum toolkit: a PDF with embedded links for each document, including program measures and session ‘blocks’
- Leadership Toolkits: included in the curriculum document, covering policy, system and environmental leadership activities for promotion by Teen Battle Chefs
- Cooking tools: available at manufacturer discount price
- Sample food orders
- Virtual version: Teen Battle Chef LIVE Online (10 sessions for live, online instruction complete with recipe templates, powerpoint presentations and mechanisms for students to share their family cooking traditions online.
TBC requires participation in tailored facilitator trainings before implementing the program. The training is offered via three modes:
- Pre-training videos with a deconstructed lesson, culinary 101, food safety, etc.
- Live, hands-on training (can be virtual)
- Program management webinar
Intervention Costs
Evidence Summary
- 90% of TBC alums positively impact their friends and families around healthy eating
- 77% of alums (from 14 different schools) have maintained 4 of 6 behaviors linked to the Dietary Guidelines for Americans
- 74% of alums maintained a healthy weight up to 7 years post-program
- TBC participants average 10% higher attendance than their school average and they do not drop out of school
- TBC youth achieve higher math and reading SAT score than their counterparts who do not participate in TBC
Virtual Curriculum Outcomes:
- New visual aids (power-points/videos) were used by 92% of instructors
- Mean percentage of adolescents cooking with an instructor was 37%
- 93% of adolescents completing the post-survey felt empowered to prepare meals on their own
- 57% of adolescents regularly try to get more ‘colors” of fruits/vegetables in their meals
- A primary impact of the program was nurturing substantial food behavioral change (44%)
Evaluation publications include:
- Can the effects of high school culinary nutrition education be sustained into adulthood?
- Strategies to Promote High Schools Students’ Healthful Food Choices
- Efficacy of Teen Battle Chef Program to Shift the Academic Performance and Health Behaviors in NYC High School Students
- Understanding Barriers and Facilitators to Virtual Culinary Nutrition Instruction for Youth
Evidence-based Approach: Research-tested
Evaluation Indicators
Readiness and Capacity – Short Term (ST) | Changes – Medium Term (MT) | Effectiveness and Maintenance – Long Term (LT) | Population Results (R) | |
---|---|---|---|---|
Individual | ST1, ST2, ST4 | MT1 | LT1 | |
Environmental Settings | ST5, ST6 | MT5, MT6 | ||
Sectors of Influence |
Evaluation Materials
- Pre-and post-program survey (now in its fourth iteration using Self Determination theory and YRBSS questions)
- Focus group discussion guides
- Student and teacher key information interview guides
Additionally, the following measures/data are evaluated/collected through the intervention but are not stand-alone evaluation tools:
- Culinary skill measures
- SMART goal development
- Diaries to share how mood, sleep, energy level changed by focus on SMART goals
- Make One Share One family food critic form
- Student reflection exercises: 12 qualitative, short-answer constructs obtain self-reported data on how learning to cook affected different areas of participants’ lives
Additional Information
Contact Person:
Lynn Fredericks
Founder
212-867-3929
lynn@familycookproductions.com
*Updated as of October 26, 2023