September is National Childhood Obesity Awareness Month, a time to recognize the challenges and opportunities we face in supporting children’s health. As part of our FFH Science Spotlight, we spoke with Carol Smathers, OSU Extension Field Specialist in Youth Nutrition and Wellness, to learn more about her work and how Ohio State is helping kids and families build healthier futures.
What first inspired your work in youth nutrition and wellness, and what continues to motivate you today?
My interest in supporting access to healthy foods and physical activity started when I was a high school exchange student in East Africa. I realized then what a vast range of resources and opportunities children have related to health. When I returned home at age 17, I volunteered with an organization that was establishing one of the first major food banks in Wisconsin. Since then, I have earned degrees in Community Health, Education, and Public Health. My initial work at Ohio State University was with the Children, Youth, and Families at Risk project through Extension’s 4-H Youth Development Program. I later managed the Prevention Research Center in the OSU College of Public Health, which addressed barriers parents face as they seek to maintain a healthy weight in their preschool age children.
In my current role as an Extension Field Specialist, I direct the Ohio Farm to School Program and serve as PI on the CDC-funded High Obesity Program (HOP), which our team prefers to call the “Healthy Opportunities Program”. In each of these roles, I have continually been motivated by cross-sector collaborations that work to bring about increased awareness and knowledge along with policy, system, and environment changes that support healthier choices.
From your perspective, what are the biggest challenges families and communities face in preventing childhood obesity?
Parents want what is best for their children. At the same time, complex food access (proximity, cost, affordability, time, convenience, etc.), social and cultural influences (traditions, norms, stereotypes, biases, status, expectations, social support, etc.), and systemic factors (poverty, food industry marketing and tactics, etc.) affect their food choices.
In her book How the Other Half Eats: The Untold Story of Food and Inequality in America, Priya Fielding-Singh sums it up well: (I highly recommend this book!)
“It is one thing to be able to find and afford cauliflower. But it is another to want to buy that cauliflower, to choose to spend one’s money on the cauliflower (at the expense of other purchases), to have the time and know-how to cook that cauliflower, and to possess the patience to weather one’s child’s complaints and pleas for macaroni and cheese and soldier on to feed that cauliflower to one’s child. Only a handful of parents I met had all of these things. The vast majority didn’t.”
Can you share a recent project or program you’ve led that is making a difference for kids’ nutrition, health, or wellness in Ohio?
The Farm to School Program supports schools and early care and education sites to better purchase, serve, and teach kids about local foods. A big part of teaching kids about how food grows is engaging them in raising foods in school gardens. Research strongly suggests that Farm to School activities, including school gardening, promote healthy behaviors, increase students’ willingness to try new foods, improve students’ academic achievement in science, math, language arts, and writing, improve students’ motivation to learn, and increase interest in and awareness of food systems and agriculture careers. Garden-based learning has also been shown to provide students with a sense of self-efficacy and achievement through hands-on work, which is not often gained in the classroom.
Through our partnership with Columbus City Schools, over 300 of the district’s classrooms are now engaged in growing foods!
What role do schools, communities, and Extension programs play in supporting healthy habits for children and families?
Because many children eat breakfast and lunch at school, community groups and Extension programs play an important role in connecting food service directors to local producers, offering guidance on healthy menu options that are creditable through the USDA meal programs, serving healthy foods in ways kids will eat them, and engaging kids in growing foods themselves—because if they grow it, they will eat it!
How does your research and outreach at Ohio State contribute to addressing the national childhood obesity epidemic?
Recognizing that educators face many common school garden barriers, a team from OSU Extension collaborated with Columbus City Schools to research effective ways to support teachers to implement garden-based education throughout the academic year. That research resulted in the publication of Growing Teachers Throughout the Seasons: Techniques and Learning Connections for Growing Foods at Schools During the School Year in Almost Any Climate (“GTS”). GTS guidebooks, online modules, information sheets and videos (go.osu.edu/gts) have been disseminated to and widely adopted by K-14 teachers, early childhood educators, and Extension professionals across Ohio and across the US. Over 1600 GTS guidebooks have been sold since being published in April 2024.
What are 2–3 simple, evidence-based strategies families can use to help kids build healthy eating and activity habits?
In my work with the Healthy Kids Coalition of Central Ohio, we encourage families to eat meals together, involve kids in food preparation, and model healthy behaviors themselves. One of the most important strategies we promote is drinking “Water First for Thirst” and avoiding sugar sweetened beverages. Families can keep in mind that healthy eating doesn’t have to be expensive. My household budget was $1.50/person/meal between 2018-2022 and has been $2.00/person/meal since 2023. Families can keep grocery costs down by planning meals around whole foods, limiting processed foods, and sticking to suggested serving portions. Because foods often offer parents a way to say “yes” to their children, parents may want to find alternate ways to treat their children to something special.
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