Oh the stresses of working with Teachers!

Have any of you seen this picture? The Food Guide Pyramid looks a lot different than the old one, huh? They've even changed it since I was in school, but I like this new design. One thing I've learned though is that it is difficult to teach kids in K-2 about this pyramid....I mean... when kids are that age, they learn to group things by color. To a kindergarten student, grapes would probably go in the purple group, blueberries in the blue group, carrots in the orange group etc. However, that's not the case. The grapes, blueberries, strawberries and green apples all go in the red group, the carrots go with the spinach, tomoatos and onions in the green group and so on....That could be pretty confusing for young kids, and as a result, teachers are looking for simple ways to teach about the food guide pyramid. So....my new job will partly be to create lesson plans and resources that do just that! But...how did I learn this was a difficult thing for students to learn? Well...I have been conducting interviews for the Arizona Nutrition Network, conducting an impact evaluation to determine why teachers are or aren't teaching nutrition in schools! It's been a fascinating process, but it's getting a little stressful now!

I only have 11 school days left to complete 13 interviews with teachers! Theoretically, that's not too hard. However, I've been calling and calling and calling the 13 remaining teachers and they never answer their phones! So.....I just emailed the contact person at each school to get the emails of the teachers I haven't talked with and all I can do is hope they get back to me and that the teachers get back to me too! I mean....42 surveys takes a lot of time, and getting 29 of them done is great, but 42 isn't necessarily the best sample size and I MUST complete these before school is out otherwise my project will be majorly delayed. NOT GOOD AT ALL! The Nutrition Network has already been so patient with me, allowing me to travel and do Miss AZ stuff, and they never complained when my priority was Miss America Prep and not Nutrition Network Impact Evaluation, so I feel even more pressure to finish on time and do a good job, ya know?

And as if that weren't difficult enough.... I can't just call any of my teacher friends and interview them. There are very specific guidelines for who can be intereviewed, and all the teachers must be elementary school teachers in the Sunnyside School District! Oh well....guess we just keep trying!

On a lighter note though....I LOVE what I'm doing! I get to interview teachers about an amazing nutrition education program and I get to learn why teachers don't teach nutrition, what's so difficult about it, and I find out lots of interesting facts about how many know their wellness policies, how many of them enforce the state snack policy, etc. They also give amazing feedback and suggestions on how we can improve the program, and in July, when I'm a part time Graduate Assistant at the Network, I will be have the cool job of analyzing all the data and making the improvements suggested, as well as create any resources and materials we don't have but teachers want! It's a pretty cool process and I love what I do!

In the end, I guess the stress of completing the interviews isn't that big of a deal, as long as I love what I do, right???