Wellness Program Implementation: School & Student Toolkits

The project is designed to evaluate a participatory implementation model in HealthCorps (HC) high schools and to assess outcomes within and across school settings . The behavioral objectives from the 2010 Dietary Guidelines to address obesity in youth include: 1) decreasing sugary beverage intake; 2) increasing frequency of breakfast; 3) increasing vegetable and fruit intake to 2½ cups per day;4) decreasing frequency of fast food meals;5) becoming physically active (goal of 1 hour per day); and 6) reducing sedentary behavior time (\<2 hour day). The study is employing system dynamics modeling (SDM) to assess wellness programming options and to evaluate the program implementation within the context of diverse school ecologies. The RE-AIM evaluation metric (Reach, Effectiveness, Adoption, Implementation, and Maintenance) is used to guide SDM development and validation. The Specific Aims are: 1. To use PAR (Participatory Action Research) methods to refine the school wellness program model and toolkit components that address institutional/community level program implementation barriers and individual level barriers to achieving healthy lifestyle recommendations. 2. To assess the effectiveness of program components using process evaluation techniques guided by the RE-AIM (Reach, Effectiveness, Adoption, Implementation, and Maintenance) model. 3. To evaluate implementation with system dynamics modeling to facilitate dissemination. The simulation analysis will apply the RE-AIM framework to address: Reach (participation rates), effectiveness (outcomes), adoption (acceptability), implementation (intervention fidelity), and maintenance (sustainability of lifestyle changes by students and programs by schools), in order to facilitate refining the toolkits and training program for dissemination to other school setting and diverse educational venues.