Over the course of the past few years, corporate wellness strategies have been on the rise, and for good reason. When executed properly, they can not only improve the overall health of your workforce, they can also increase productivity and positively affect your organization’s bottom line. But what makes a wellness program effective, and what are companies doing to respond to the events of the last few years? Read on to learn more.
The Benefits of an Effective Corporate Wellness Strategy
Creating a plan to encourage healthy eating and active living among your employees will benefit not only them but your organization as a whole. Below are some of the major reasons why you may want to consider developing a corporate wellness strategy of your own.
Decrease in Absenteeism
Corporate wellness strategies can help create a more physically and mentally healthy workforce. A healthier workforce is far less likely to miss time on the job, meaning you can all but cross absenteeism off your list of things to worry about as the leader of your organization.
Combat Chronic Disease
A good corporate wellness strategy is a form of chronic disease prevention. With the proper resources, education, and support system in place, your staff can learn to take on healthier habits and avoid serious health issues.
Save Money on Healthcare Costs
A generally healthy staff is most likely going to require much fewer and less expensive medical costs than an unhealthy one. That means that investing in a corporate wellness program can ultimately save your organization money on healthcare and related expenses.
Creating an Effective Health Strategy in a Post-Pandemic World
Just like pretty much everything else over the course of the past year, corporate health strategies have been completely altered by the COVID-19 pandemic. With remote work becoming far more prevalent and mental health issues on the rise, organizations are going to need to adjust their wellness programs to reflect these changes and a number of others. Below are some of the major focal points of post-pandemic corporate health strategies.
● Increased telemedicine and video resources ● Greater access to mental health benefits ● Adjustment to the work-from-home model ● Increased support for those with chronic conditions ● Greater use of public health data
Although vaccines are being distributed and the world is slowly returning to normal, certain changes resulting from COVID-19 may be permanent. It’s imperative to acknowledge these changes in order to create an effective corporate wellness program.
Reaching Beyond the Workplace
Companies have an opportunity to positively affect community health with their wellness programs, too. By creating a workplace that values health, you can serve as a healthy eating and active-living model for other companies and to your community as a whole.
Your company could also take it one step further than that and partner with community organizations in order to engage in public health advocacy. Using your platform to do things like combat hunger in the state, take a stand against food insecurity and health disparities, and promote a healthy lifestyle can boost your community and your company’s reputation.
Ready to incorporate HEAL into your workplace? Contact us today and we can help outline your next steps and provide you with resources to get started.
School meals are an essential part of every student’s day. Research by Tufts University shows that for many kids, the meals they eat at school are the most nutritionally balanced meals they get all day. Why is this so important now that COVID-19 lockdowns are over and people are back to their somewhat normal routines?
Because the pressure of paying for school meals, after a two-year hiatus, is back and creating a greater challenge for many parents to find room in their budgets to ante up.
According to the SC Department of Education’s 2021-2022 student enrollment report, 61% of students live in poverty. That’s based on all 74 school districts in the state, composed of 1,200 schools that serve over 777,000 students in Pre-K through 12th grade.
A solution for parents is to apply for free or reduced school meals through their school administrators. An even better solution is for school districts or schools to apply for the USDA’s Community Eligibility Program (CEP).
What is CEP?
According to No Kid Hungry, CEP is a unique school meal funding option of the National School Lunch Act that makes it possible for schools to provide free meals to all students. That means no more free or reduced lunch applications, fewer administrative burdens, and fewer social stigmas for students to deal with at school.
How does CEP impact families and students?
Improves student attendance and advancement. A study published in the Journal of Hunger & Environmental Nutrition found significant benefits for students attending CEP schools, including higher attendance rates and more students advancing beyond 10th grade.
Fights hunger. The same study mentioned in the previous bullet also found students attending schools with CEP were nearly 3 times less likely to be food insecure.
Promotes equity and reduces stigma. CEP eliminates the out-of-pocket costs for families and reduces the stigma or embarrassment some students may feel by participating in the meals program. CEP also eliminates school lunch shaming, as no student can be turned away or given an alternative meal from failure to pay.
Reduces stress for families and students. Families with tight food budgets can rest assured that their child is getting nutritious meals at school, reducing financial strain at home. Students don’t have to worry about paying for meals either.
What are the benefits for schools?
Eliminates unpaid school debt. Every student gets free breakfast and lunch. Families don’t pay and administrators don’t have to worry about collecting money and managing accounts.
Reduces administrative burdens. Administrators apply for CEP once every four years.
Improves school nutrition staff morale. Staff focus more on nutritious meals and less on the nutrition budget.
Can generate revenue for school nutrition budgets. Oftentimes, CEP leads to an increase in breakfast and lunch participation, which increases revenue for the nutrition budget.
Can make it easier to serve meals in the classroom. Teachers only need to count the number of meals being served to students in their classroom rather than tracking free, reduced, and paid meals.
Who is eligible for CEP?
School districts or individual schools with at least 40% of “Identified Students” are eligible. The Identified Student Percentage are students who are approved for free meals without an application because they are:
Enrolled in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF), the Food Distribution Program on Indian Reservations (FDPIR), or Medicaid,
Living in a household where another student is enrolled in one of the previously mentioned programs, or
Homeless, migrant, runaway, in foster care, or enrolled in Head Start or Early Head Start.
What if my school district says it doesn’t qualify?
Some school districts may not qualify for CEP because the total enrollment of all the schools in the district does not meet the Identified Student Percentage of at least 40 percent. In this case, individual schools can apply for CEP if they meet the required percentage. Contact your school principal or school nutrition administrator and ask them about CEP.
Why don’t all school districts in a single county qualify for CEP?
In some cases where there are multiple school districts in one county, district-wide eligibility for CEP varies because CEP is based on household income. In Richland County, Richland One participates in CEP, so all students get free breakfast and lunch. In Richland School District Two, the district is not eligible for CEP because its Identified Student Percentage is less than 40 percent. Richland One is composed of more low-income families as opposed to Richland Two. This is an unfortunate fact that negatively impacts struggling families, school equity, and student mental health.
Are there alternatives for school districts, schools, and families that don’t qualify?
Provision 2 of the National School Lunch Act enables any school to provide free meals to students. There are no eligibility requirements under Provision 2 as there are with CEP, and also unlike CEP, you can choose to offer universal breakfast and/or lunch.
Non-pricing is another funding option for universal free school meals where schools have funding support from the local government, school board, or private sources. Meals are served free to all students, and meals are counted and claimed by fee category. The difference between federal reimbursement and program costs would have to come from non-federal funding.
It’s safe to say that most of us would like to see some sort of change in our communities and the world at large, but maybe most of us don’t know how to make that change happen.
While community betterment work may seem daunting, who will do it if you and your neighbors don’t? Plus, making a change where you live is one of the most fulfilling things any person can do.
There is a famous quote about change. Margaret Mead reminds us to “never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has.”
If you’re looking to make a difference and create change in your community, read on for some inspiring ideas.
The Best Ways to Give Back
There are many ways for you to give back to your community and help to improve it, and all of them involve one or more of the following three things: Time, effort, and generosity.
Whichever you feel you have or can give the most of, start there. For example, if you’re able to, donate money or resources to a local charitable cause. If you have extra time on your hands, get involved in grassroots advocacy or volunteer your time to help influence policy and create systemic change. Below are some more ideas for getting active in your community.
Youth Engagement Programs
Perhaps the best way to create positive change in your community is by reaching out to its youngest members and offering your knowledge, skills, and experience. If you can influence the youth of your community, you can influence the future of your community.
Community Health Initiatives
Nutrition and physical health have a direct impact on mental and emotional health. The consequences affect all the individuals in your community as well as your community as a whole. Seek better community funding for health initiatives, engage in food insecurity advocacy, or advocate for better community training. These are just three examples of how you can address systemic issues in your community and help make a difference.
Community Celebrations
Few things bring people closer together than tradition and celebration. If you can help organize a celebratory event for your community, you may open the door for more serious work to get done.
No one way of giving back to your community is necessarily greater or more effective than another. What’s important is that whatever you choose to do speaks to you.
The Ripple Effect of Trying to Make a Difference
When you take the time to engage with your community and make a difference, you inspire other people to do the same. Those people will then aim to “pay it forward” and make a difference themselves, and so on and so forth.
You may only be one person with limited time and resources, but the ripple effect of the good you do will reach far beyond yourself. Start that ripple effect today and get involved in community initiatives.
If you’re ready to get involved, contact us today and we can connect you with a community leader!
Depending on how long you’ve been keeping up with Wholespire, you may be aware that we award mini-grants to community coalitions and organizations periodically. Our application process is competitive, meaning we weigh various health outcomes, population, and demographic data to help determine the most need. However, what you may not know is why we offer mini-grants, rather than large chunks of money. In this post, we’ll explain the history of our mini-grants and the reason we use this model.
What is the Mini-Grant Model?
Mini-grants are grant awards that are relatively small amounts of money and typically have short implementation periods.
Since 2018, Wholespire has been offering mini-grants of up to $5,000 to community coalitions, schools, local government, faith-based groups, and other non-profit organizations. These mini-grants can be used to implement a policy, systems, or environmental change that addresses healthy eating and/or active living. To date, 45 mini-grants have been awarded for projects like:
Add signage to an existing walking loop,
Add fitness stations to parks,
Create community gardens,
Include bilingual signage at farmers’ markets, and
Start new HYPE teams to lead civic action projects similar to the ones just listed.
Why Wholespire Adopted the Mini-Grant Model
Before 2018, Wholespire awarded large grants with a longer implementation period to help a small number of communities work on multiple improvement projects. Our hope was there would be a greater health impact. But that didn’t happen with all of the communities we funded.
Some communities experienced challenges, while others didn’t. Receiving a large amount of money can be overwhelming. It isn’t always easy to choose how to spend the money and what areas to tackle first. Sometimes it’s difficult to reach a consensus, while other times, you get so bogged down in a couple of strategies that the other strategies and the money get lost.
After evaluating these instances, Wholespire noticed that even when coalitions have large amounts of grant funding, they tend to spend their money in smaller increments like $5-$10,000 rather than spending large amounts of money at one time. We concluded that change needed to happen. We needed to look internally and adopt a different approach to grantmaking. So, we began using the mini-grant model to help grantees manage their awards better.
Successes Related to the Mini-Grant Model
We found that the smaller mini-grant investments led to a domino effect of momentum in communities. Oftentimes, the mini-grants led to investments by community partners as well as in-kind donations. Adopting this model meant we would be able to give more coalitions and organizations the opportunity to apply for these small grants.
In addition to being able to reach more coalitions, it gives community coalitions and organizations a chance to implement a project without the burden of managing large amounts of funding or committing to a long period of time. Coalitions can organize and work on community action plans without the time constraints of a grant and then apply for a mini-grant when they are ready to carry out their plan of action.
Our experiences have shown that many community coalitions and organizations are looking for a few hundred dollars to complete a project that fits our mission, while others need seed money to get a project moving. Wholespire provides funding opportunities, when available, for not only these reasons but ultimately to reduce health disparities, improve health equity, and increase access to healthy choices.
As pioneers of policy, systems, and environmental change in South Carolina, Wholespire has provided technical assistance to hundreds of community coalitions and partners over the past 15 years. It’s a service we provide to help build the capacity of and sustain community coalitions, strengthen community-based projects, and improve the likelihood of better health outcomes.
Oftentimes, technical assistance is provided to partner organizations and addresses other areas of our work, like advocacy, youth engagement, and marketing. In this post, we’ll define technical assistance, show some examples, and tell you how you can take advantage of our technical assistance services.
What is technical assistance?
Technical assistance, also known as TA and commonly referred to as consulting, is the process of providing specific support to a community coalition or organization with a development need or problem. It is an effective method for building the capacity of any community coalition or organization.
Technical assistance can be provided in a variety of ways. It can be one-on-one consultation or small group facilitation. It can be provided in person or by phone, email, or other online methods. In addition to being referred to as consulting, TA is also known as coaching or mentoring.
At Wholespire, TA applies to our areas of expertise – policy, systems, and environmental strategies, advocacy, coalition development and sustainability, The HYPE Project®, and marketing and communications. The range of subtopics is almost endless. The only area our TA does not cover is IT support.
Why is it important?
Technical assistance is important to any community coalition or organization, no matter the stage of development and operations. When you don’t have expertise in a specific area in your coalition or organization, leaning on consultants is often used to learn more about the issue, the needs of the community or group, develop action plans, the actual implementation of those plans, and any steps needed after to sustain the effort.
Technical assistance can lend to the longevity of your coalition or organization. It’s called capacity building – the process of developing and strengthening the skills, instincts, abilities, processes, and resources that organizations and communities need to survive, adapt and thrive in a fast-changing world (United Nations).
What does it cost?
At Wholespire, we provide free and fee-based technical assistance services. Free technical assistance is provided to Wholespire chapters and grantees. TA can range from organizational structure and partnership development to advocacy/policy development and project implementation. Another example of free TA is when a mini-grant applicant needs guidance on the application or requests, input on their project idea, or needs help getting over unforeseen hurdles during their project. TA also includes connecting our grantees with other existing local community health initiatives that can complement their project, open up doors for future collaboration, lead to other funding opportunities, and, ultimately, make communities healthier and more equitable.
Fee-based TA is a contracted service provided to partners and other organizations that request assistance. This service addresses similar areas as our free service; however, they’re typically more specific. An example is partnering with Healthy People Healthy Carolinas to help their grantees with achieving their goals. Another example is providing an advocacy training series, resources, and tools to the SC Alliance for Health, Physical Education, Recreation and Dance to help them understand and begin advocacy work.
Remember, technical assistance plays a key role in developing and sustaining community coalitions and organizations into the future. It’s a way to use expert help to assess current capacity, build on strengths, and address underlying needs. If your community coalition or organization is interested in learning more about our technical assistance services, contact us at info@wholespire.org.
By now, you’ve probably heard about or seen our new name. But, what exactly does it mean? There’s a complete ideology behind the Wholespire name and logo. And, we’re going to explain it to you!
Why did we rebrand?
When an organization or business wants to change its name and logo, there’s a reason behind that decision to move forward. Wholespire’s decision was based on the evolution of its work from only healthy eating and active living (HEAL) to HEAL plus other public health issues like chronic disease prevention and management. The new brand also allows Wholespire to support partner initiatives related to HEAL like school lunch debt, pay equity, fair housing, poverty, and other social and economic factors that impact access to healthy opportunities and choices.
How did we do it?
After issuing a rebrand Request for Proposal and interviewing several qualified candidates, Wholespire chose to work with TRIO Solutions, Inc. out of Mt. Pleasant, SC. TRIO hit the ground running and researched all of our existing marketing resources, interviewed a diverse group of partners, provided reports of their findings, and pointed out our strengths and weaknesses. It was clear that we made the right decision to rebrand.
What’s in a name?
When you look at any organization or business name and logo, there’s a meaning behind those elements. There’s a meaning behind ours.
The name and logo creation phase resulted in a name and logo that represented all our wishes. We wanted something short and purposeful. Something impactful and unique. Something representative of what we do. TRIO set out on a brainstorming journey that included many ideas, making our decision not so easy. We chose Wholespire!
Wholespire combines the word “whole” (referring to all of something; in good health) with the words “aspire” (what you’re striving for) and “inspire” (what you hope to evoke in people). Wholespire is the state in which a complete and harmonious community is achieved.
Is there meaning in a logo?
Yes, there is a meaning behind the elements of logos. For Wholespire, we wanted something colorful, energizing, and memorable. TRIO, again, provided multiple logo drafts, making our decision even harder than choosing the name.
The image below depicts the meaning behind each element of the Wholespire logo:
What about the colors?
Through the rebranding process, we learned that choosing colors have meaning too. People associate different emotions with colors. We wanted our new colors to speak harmoniously to our partners and audiences.
Our new brand more effectively illuminates our support of local initiatives and advocacy that inspire wellness in all communities. We believe our new name reflects how coming together to increase access to wellness in communities creates unification and wholeness.
We are Wholespire and we’re here to serve communities as we have for the past 14 years! Contact us if you have questions about our rebrand journey.
ESMMSC Executive Meg Stanley and Manager of Policy & Advocacy Phil Ford volunteer during a food distribution in Fairfield County.
Somewhere, someplace, somehow, an Eat Smart Move More South Carolina (ESMMSC) staff member is guiding a coalition, a partner, a HYPE team, or a partner through a project or process that will lead to a better outcome. It’s called technical assistance, and it’s just one of the driving forces behind the work of the organization. Technical assistance can be many non-financial forms of help like connecting coalitions to funding, sharing information, providing training, consulting on projects, and leadership coaching. That’s what ESMMSC staff do, even during a pandemic.
“Our staff immediately saw the problems people would be facing with food access, especially the children who depended on school food. It’s the one place hungry children can rely on for a sure meal,” said Meg Stanley, executive director at ESMMSC. “We couldn’t imagine having hundreds of thousands of children sitting at home without healthy meals.”
ESMMSC convened as many statewide and local partners (over 100) to address the emergency food insecurity issues caused by COVID-19. Resources were pulled together, emergency preparedness strategies were shared, and a webpage of resources and food distribution sites across the state was published. All of this coordination, brainstorming, and action happened within two weeks with website updates and food insecurity calls continuing in the months to come.
ESMMSC partnered with Healthy Learners and SC PASOS to create Spanish language versions of the food distribution information located on the ESMMSC website.
“When Healthy Learners approached us about translating the food distribution portion of the website for the Latinx community, we said yes without hesitation,” said Stanley. “We completely embrace diversity, equity, and inclusion, and so it made absolute sense to partner on the translation and distribute the information to the Latinx community.”
As the coronavirus lingered over the following months, ESMMSC applied for and was awarded a grant from the OneSC Fund to provide mini-grants to communities in immediate need of assistance in addressing hunger. Forty communities received funding to purchase healthy foods and personal protective equipment.
“We did not turn our backs on those rapid response grant applicants that were not funded,” said Stanley. “We connected them to other funders and other community organizations and encouraged them to pull their resources together. We were not going to leave them wondering what to do next.”
In addition to connecting the applicants to other resources, ESMMSC staff had the opportunity to provide more technical assistance to communities:
Assisted in securing grant funds from another source for food distributions.
Connected state legislators to local coalitions interested in hosting food distributions.
Volunteered at many food distribution events.
Connected a restaurant in need of donating food to a local Council on Aging.
Requested Healthy Blue donate bags for food distributions. And they did!
Shared stories of local coalitions’ food distribution efforts and how they made them safe for everyone.
“While the coronavirus has been stressful and long, it has brought out the good in people. We’ve witnessed an outpouring of love for those in need from our partners, our community members, and our elected officials,” said Stanley. “Our partners and our staff did a fantastic job leading, connecting, and making things happen in a time of crisis. We’re not out of the woods. Food insecurity remains a priority for us and our partners.”
Have you attended an Eat Smart Move More South Carolina (ESMMSC) meeting or event and felt annoyed that your only beverage options were water and unsweetened tea? Or that your only food options were salads, wraps, or grilled chicken? There’s a reason for that! ESMMSC has a Healthy Meetings and Wellness Policy that supports its mission and work: to advance community-led change to reduce obesity, by making the healthy choice the easy choice for every South Carolinian.
Many organizations and businesses are implementing healthy meetings and events practices. To send the message that health is important to them, to help support the health of the employees, members, and partners, and to have more energized and engaged participants, organizations and businesses should adopt healthy meetings and events policies too.
“If we served sugar-sweetened beverages, fried foods, and went heavy on refined carbs at our meetings and events where food is served, it would completely go against everything our organization stands for,” said Meg Stanley, executive director at ESMMSC. “We care about the health of everyone we come in contact with, so it just makes sense to have these types of policies in place and to implement them.”
Far too often, organizations and businesses serve unhealthy breakfast, lunch, and snack foods at conferences and meetings. And that’s easy to do when there aren’t policies in place that provide guidelines.
“For example, if you’re a health insurance company and your mission, in part, is to keep healthcare costs down, serving fried chicken at a meeting makes it hard to say you’re staying true to your mission,” says Stanley. “The same is true for any business, small or large. If you care about employee health and wellness, you should have a policy in place and enforce that policy.”
Since its inception in 2007, ESMMSC has maintained and implemented a Healthy Meetings and Wellness Policy: Given our mission to make the healthy choice the easy choice for every South Carolinian, ESMMSC aims to create a workplace that promotes and supports healthy lifestyles for both employees and partners. As such, ESMMSC has adopted the following wellness policies: Healthy Meetings and Catering, Movement Meetings, Physical Activity Opportunities, Sharing Food, and Staff Wellness.
Each of these policies provides opportunities to those who attend ESMMSC meetings and events, as well as staff, to eat healthy foods and to engage in healthy activities. Download the ESMMSC policy.
“I’ll be honest, when I started working at ESMMSC eight years ago, I wasn’t thrilled about the policies, but I’ve come to appreciate them. They make me accountable for my health and wellness,” says Brandie Freeman, communications and marketing manager at ESMMSC. “With these policies in place, I drink more water, snack on fruits instead of chips and candy, and have managed to eat more vegetables with my meals. I mean, I’m not perfect. I still indulge, but I don’t do it quite so often.”
If your organization or business would like to adopt a Healthy Meetings and Wellness Policy, there are a couple of reputable resources available online. You can also contact ESMMSC.
Adopting a Healthy Meetings and Wellness Policy is a great way to highlight the culture of health within your organization or business and be part of the growing movement around health and wellness. For more information, contact Executive Director Meg Stanley at meg@eatsmartmovemoresc.org or Manager of Policy and Advocacy Phil Ford at phil@eatsmartmovemoresc.org.
Whether you realize it or not, you’ve probably been advocating for things throughout your life. Did you ask your parents for a pet and give them reasons why you deserve one? Have you ever asked your boss for a raise and explained why you deserve it? What about raising concerns about your loved one’s healthcare with their provider? If you answered yes to any of these questions, then you are an advocate.
Advocacy is an activity by an individual or group that aims to influence decisions within political, economic, and social systems and institutions. Advocacy is presenting a problem or a need to elected officials, and it’s almost always accompanied by a solution.
“One thing my mom used to tell me growing up: don’t just come to me with a problem. Come to me with a solution as well,” says Phil Ford, manager of policy and advocacy. “It’s important for legislators to be made aware of the problem but it’s even more important to let them know that you want to work with them to find an appropriate solution.”
Advocacy is, perhaps, the most effective way to make change happen on any level of government because the issues directly impact the day to day lives of every citizen in a town or county – not to mention the state.
Communicating with your elected officials is important. They often only hear from constituents when they need something. It’s just as important to thank them for a vote on a bill or resolution, or for standing with you on the issues.
“Don’t be afraid to contact your decision-makers. They often hear from constituents only when something is needed, but they’re not recognized when they do the “right” thing. So, when you notice a decision-maker who’s done the “right” thing, thank them and let them know,” says Ford.
Everyone can advocate. Whether it’s asking your own legislator for support or only distributing facts to elected officials, every individual has the right to advocate. Use our Steps to Effective Advocacy handout to guide you through your next advocacy campaign. For a further explanation of advocacy, download our What is Advocacy handout.
