Disappointed

At long last I was able to attend a CATCH training.  I have spoken of the program many times.  It is an evidence based multi component school based obesity prevention program.

The trainer who delivered the curriculum and came from Texas to teach the school how to implement it, left me flat and disappointed.  In fact, I did not even stay for the whole event.

I was disappointed by the presentation style, use of old information (my pyramid), the referencing of policy not related to this state, and the lack of connection to this school district.  These things greatly impacted the trainers ability to create or provide MOTIVATION and a great opportunity  was LOST - 

You can bet I tried though - interspersing when I could.  Truly - I would have done a better job at engaging the audience even with my outsider knowledge of CATCH.

Still there was some interest and sparks of life.  Some good connections between lessons and messages were made.  The activity breaks were pretty cool and provided examples that the teachers could replicate with their students. 

I was disheartened to hear talk about parents consistently using fast food restaurants, children not wanting to try new things and similar misconceptions or blaming.

It is true. People are responsible for their choices but those of us who are not living in poverty are responsible for understanding the context under which people make those choices.  MONEY, time, location, marketing and other pressures. 

Even more so now as today I heard on the news that 1 in 5 children or 15 million, are living in poverty.  Sorry to say - but healthy food is not cheap food and these are challenges that are faced by the parents of those 15 million children - not all of them are selfish and lazy - in fact, most of them are not.