Author: Nancy Owens
Planning Unit: Allen County CES
Major Program: Nutrition and Food Systems General
Outcome: Long-Term Outcome
When COVID-19 hit and all classes came to a halt and the unemployment rate jumped from 4.8% to 14.9%, the Allen County Nutrition Education Program (NEP) Assistant started thinking about ways to help in the community. Also, the Allen County COVID-19 shut down the school for a short period of time. 51% of the Allen County children are not Kindergarten readiness. Allen County NEP started contacting area agencies for outreach opportunities. Allen, Logan and Simpson Early Childhood Council, Allen County Cooperative Family and Consumer Science, Allen County Public Library, Need More Acres, Allen County Head Start teamed up with the Nutrition Education Program for community outreach. Allen County NEP contacted several of the daycares in Allen County for delivery of bags to Creative Learning Center, Little Sprouts Daycare, Allen County Headstart Program and 4 home daycares.
On September 24th, 2021, various themed bags were assembled for families with children between the ages 2 to 5 in Allen County. A total of 7 different deliveries were made with themed bags including a nutritious recipe with the ingredients in the bags for the family to cook together. Also in the recipe bag was a plastic kid safe knife. This is to help the child learn some safety kitchen skills. The bags also included 6 different educational kindergarten readiness activities with directions. The parent and child could do the activities together and be prepared for kindergarten readiness. These activities meet the Kentucky Governors guidelines for kindergarten readiness. There were 148 bags delivered to the 7 different sites.
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