Food, Movement, and You

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FOOD, MOVEMENT, & YOU

Food, Movement, & You is a free diabetes prevention and nutrition education program for families facing homelessness. Our program provides families experiencing homelessness opportunities to enhance their knowledge of the role of a healthful diet, increasing access to nutrient-dense foods, learning how to grow, prepare, and consume healthful foods, and increase physical activity, or “movement.”

As part of the University’s Driving Out Diabetes Initiative Food, Movement, & You (FMU) was created to provide free diabetes prevention and nutrition education for families facing homelessness across the Salt Lake Valley. Through these efforts we aim to improve health outcomes for families experiencing homelessness in Utah.

Our program aims to provide families experiencing homelessness opportunities to:

  1. Increase access to nutrient-dense foods,
  2. Enhance knowledge of the role diet plays in health,
  3. Learn how to produce, prepare, and consume healthy foods, and
  4. Increase physical activity, or “movement.”

Food, Movement, and You program manager, Shannon Jones, and colleagues received a grant from the National Science Foundation based on the long-term collaboration with Wasatch Community Gardens and local homeless service providers.

Community Engagement

Food, Movement, and You engages with community members and organizations to address barriers to healthful eating for Utah families experiencing homelessness. These include:

  • Collaborating with Waste Less Solutions to provide opportunities for community members to assist in diverting edible food from restaurants, catered events, and local gardeners to local community service organizations.

  • Providing healthy recipes that feature shelf-stable foods available in emergency pantries and fresh produce available through donation.

  • Delivering fresh produce from Wasatch Community Gardens' Farm to local shelters and Resource Centers.

  • Running a twice-weekly community garden club in conjunction with women from Wasatch Community Gardens' Green Team, a farm-based job training program for women facing homelessness. Families are able to learn about and grow organic produce for their families, while our students learn from lived experience experts about the barriers to healthful eating for people experiencing homelessness. The photos below are from the community garden.

  • Picking up and delivering Grade-A organic produce grown at and donated by Wasatch Community Gardens' Farm to emergency food pantries at local homeless service housing facilities and Homeless Resource Centers

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