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The purpose of this newsletter is to provide quick contacts to KNN partner agencies and to other resources that might be helpful to our partners. You should be able to read this newsletter in less than 5 minutes – that’s our goal!

KNN May Newsletter

Welcome to the May 2004 issue of KNN’s email newsletter. Please visit our web site at www.kansasnutritionnetwork.org For our KNN partners, you can complete the “Depth of Involvement” form on-line. We are always interested in how our partners are “partnering” to improve nutrition and physical activity education throughout Kansas.
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Our Featured Link this month is to the National Hunger Awareness Day page. www.hungerday.org. Be sure to check out this website! Also check the Resources for Children page on our web page. There's a great new article by Joanne Ikeda on using candy to reward children. www.kansasnutritionnetwork.org

There is also an updated Partners List this month. If you find any errors in your organization information, please let us know.

Food Stamp application information is now available on line in Spanish. From the KNN website, click on “How” then “SRS Self Assessment.”

Upcoming KNN meetings: May 20 in Topeka at Washburn University-- Marvin Stottlemire will be talking about how to make good writing even better. July 15 also in Topeka. KNN is planning to coordinate our meeting with KACAP’s meeting. This looks like it will be a very worthwhile and important meeting both for KNN partners and for KACAP. September 23 – topic and place still pending.
Although the food security status for individual families changed substantially from 1997 to 1999, the prevalence of food insecurity was relatively stable: In both years, about 1 family in 10 was food insecure. The report also examines families' characteristics, income, and Food Stamp Program participation. http://www.ers.usda.gov/Publications/EFAN04001/
"RACE, ETHNICITY, AND ECONOMIC WELL-BEING" (Urban Institute, March 18, 2004) Poverty decreased among blacks, Hispanics, and whites between 1997 and 2002, and the gap in poverty between whites and either blacks or Hispanics narrowed by three percentage points. Yet while food and housing hardship decreased among whites, blacks and Hispanics did not make comparable gains. Food hardship increased three percentage points among Hispanics from 1999 to 2002 and housing hardship increased two percentage points among blacks. http://www.urban.org/url.cfm?ID=310968

The Web site address to order the Spanish and English EAT SMART. PLAY HARD (tm) materials is http://www.fns.usda.gov/eatsmartplayhard/orderform.htm Educational materials from this national nutrition education and promotion campaign featuring the Power Panther(tm) are now available in Spanish! Promote healthy eating and physical activity using these activity sheets, bookmarks, posters and brochures. Materials are free while supplies last to those providing nutrition education to food stamp clients.

This year, America's Second Harvest will host the Third Annual National Hunger Awareness Day on Thursday, June 3rd. The theme for this year's event is One Big Table, highlighting the need for ALL Americans to have access to adequate nutritious foods -- providing them with a place at the table. Please mark your calendars for June 3rd, National Hunger Awareness Day. More information about National Hunger Awareness Day activities is available at www.hungerday.org
For the second year in a row, PARADE Magazine and Share Our Strength have joined efforts for the Great American Bake Sale. The nationwide campaign raises funds for the 13 million children in America who are hungry or at risk of hunger. In announcing the campaign, Bill Shore, Director of Share Our Strength, speaks of food as "a basic right for every American child. This is the wealthiest nation on earth, and we have the resources to wipe out child hunger in our time." http://www.greatamericanbakesale.com/
Share Our Strength will be accepting grant applications for this year's Great American Bake Sale grant-making campaign beginning April 4th. Applicants must be either current sponsors of the USDA's summer feeding or afterschool meal service programs for children, or advocacy organizations that provide technical assistance to these programs. The priority deadline to submit an online application is May 31st. The final deadline is July 25th. http://www.greatamericanbakesale.org
A new study released by HHS' Centers for Disease Control and Prevention shows that deaths due to poor diet and physical inactivity rose by 33 percent over the past decade and may soon overtake tobacco as the leading preventable cause of death. (Editorial note: The study reports “poor diet and physical inactivity,” yet what is being publicized is “overweight and obesity.”) The Healthy Lifestyles & Disease Prevention initiative encourages Americans to make small activity and dietary changes, such as using stairs instead of an elevator, or taking a walk instead of watching television. The PSA’s can be seen at: http://www.adcouncil.org/campaigns/healthy_lifestyles (Posters can be accessed from the right side of the web site and they are definitely worth a look!)

Nibbles, a newsletter for child care providers to give to parents is available on-line at http://www.fns.usda.gov/tn/Resources/nibbles.html
The National Association for Sport and Physical Education (NASPE) has developed a new parents brochure called Kids in Action with the Kellogg Company and the President's Council on Physical Fitness and Sports. The booklet presents parents and caregivers with simple ideas for physical activities that they can do with children from birth to age five to adopt an active lifestyle early and to positively impact their physical, intellectual and emotional development. To download a PDF file of the booklet, visit www.aahperd.org/naspe/template.cfm?template=kids_brochure.html.

REPORT: CHILD WELL-BEING INDEX FINDS MORE CHILDREN ARE OBESE, LIVE IN POVERTY (Brookings Institution, March 24, 2004) The Brookings Institution, in cooperation with the Foundation for Child Development and Duke University, released a new index of child well-being, which assesses trends in seven quality-of-life areas for children from 1975 to 2002. Although children are safer than they were 30 years ago and teenage birth rates have substantially declined, more children are obese, living in poverty, and attempting suicide than in 1975. See the full report and PowerPoint presentation at: http://www.brookings.org/comm/events/20040324.htm

www.kpha.bluestep.net/shared The Kansas Public Health Association is Kansas’ leading public health advocacy organization. Annual meeting is September 27-29 in Topeka.
I think our 5 minutes is just about up. Send an email to Karen Fitzgerald kfitzger@ksu.edu if you have information you want to include in next month’s KNN email newsletter.
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