Our first season!
Spring 2025
Over the spring of 2025, we completed our first full season of The Wellness Effect at College Park Academy. Here’s how it went.
Our sessions
Our first two sessions were structured, and students decided how to spend the rest of their sessions. We met as a group four times between February and April (our time was limited due to mentors’ busy competition schedules), with campaign work continuing to be completed in-between sessions. We regularly checked in on campaign progress when we couldn’t meet in-person.
Session 1
Introductions/icebreakers
Health literacy initial assessment
E-health literacy presentation & Kahoot!
Student health topic presentations & vote
Session 2
Solidify vote on health topic
Health campaign presentation & Kahoot!
Decide on medium to share campaign material
Rest of Sessions
Work on campaigns!**
** a health literacy reassessment was completed during the final session.
Our campaign
Students voted on sanitation as their community health issue of focus. They worked on material to improve sanitation among students in ways such as having a quality morning routine, effectively washing hands, and showering regularly.
Posters with QR codes
Students split into three groups to work on posters to be featured around the school, each highlighting a different aspect of sanitation (ex. showering, washing hands).
Students researched the importance of these practices and how to best practice these behaviors. They highlighted evidence on posters.
The supervising teacher had the idea of placing a QR code on each poster, linking to a “sanitation pledge” to be used by students. This would be used as a way to measure poster success.
Soap drive
We purchased bottles of Soft Soap along with germ stickers, tags, and string.
Students wrote a fact, tip, or motivational sentence about hand washing on each tag, which they tied around soap bottles and decorated with germ stickers.
Students created a poster with more facts and tips about hand washing, along with a pledge to sanitation that students could sign.
Program participants passed out soap bottles during a lunch period alongside their poster.
Impact assessment
At the beginning of the first session, participants took an assessment meant to measure health literacy. During the final session, students were reassessed. Note: there were 13 students in the first session and only 8 in the last.
Some key themes:
We saw an improvement in students’ ability to understand health information that they see or read, as well as an improved understanding of which sources of health information are reliable.
Students became less likely to follow health advice given by a website or app.
Students became more comfortable with asking a doctor questions.
It would be beneficial to see a greater increase in students’ confidence in their ability to make healthy choices for themselves.
There was a decrease in how often students check if health advice on social media is from a reliable source.
What would students like to see improved?
In the final health literacy assessment, students were asked: “If you were to participate in this program again, what would you like to see changed?”
Here are the answers.
Nothing
More hygene like washing your hands EVERYTIME you use the bathroom and eating healthier.
The classroom
nothing
Going outside more
Nothing really.
I would like to see more arts and crafts :) and washing our hands