Parental Engagement To Influence Child Nutrition Habits

Brighter Bites Salinas is a non-profit agency whose mission is to create healthy communities through fresh food. They do this by providing nutrition education to children and delivering free, fresh produce to parents. In the United States, obesity and food insecurity are common, intertwined issues among children. The contributing factors to these entangled issues are associated with living in poverty, acculturation of minority groups, and negative parental influence. The consequences of this include increased risk of chronic diseases, high-cost treatments, and mental health issues. This capstone project was created to positively engage parents in nutrition education to influence their children’s eating habits. Weekly nutrition education, recipes corresponding to the weekly produce donation, and direct access to the Brighter Bites mobile app were distributed. An assessment of the project concluded that the goals had been met. The next step for the agency includes the continual promotion of Brighter Bite’s educational resources