An essential goal of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Education Program is to equip youth of all ages with nutritional knowledge. Doing so ensures that they grow to make healthy decisions later on as adults. Throughout almost the entire year, schools and other community entities have had to figure out innovative ways to serve youth throughout the county, while also adhering to Covid-19 guidelines.

This summer, the Floyd County Cooperative Extension Office Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Education Program partnered with Floyd County Schools to deliver nutrition education to youth throughout the county. A variety of activity bags were assembled. These bags contained a Wally Cat Activity book with a word scramble, a maze, a kid-friendly cooking recipe, and a coloring page. Also included in every bag was some form of incentive, such as stickers, jump ropes, cooking aprons, footballs, and so on. The activity bags were assembled and packed in boxes for school bus drivers to deliver alongside the kids’ lunches for the School Lunch Program. 

In total, 1,884 kids throughout Floyd County received these bags! Although the activity bags do not replace face-to-face teaching, they still made an effort to equip kids with knowledge of mindfulness and healthy eating, as well as served as an incentive for them to get in some physical activity. And even though things aren’t necessarily ‘normal’ at the moment, gestures like this go on to further overall health consciousness throughout Floyd County.