In Spring 2021, GoForth Recovery in Spartanburg found out about the Let’sGo! South Carolina 3.0 mini-grant opportunity offered by Wholespire, formerly Eat Smart Move More South Carolina. They needed an outdoor fitness area to provide residents, family members, and those in the Spartanburg community with a dedicated multi-use area to enhance the recovery journey and stimulate active living.
Changing unhealthy habits isn’t easy for anyone, especially those who suffer from addiction. And oftentimes, individuals who enter a recovery program like GoForth Recovery cannot afford a gym membership or even leave the premises for physical activity. Having a resource like an onsite basketball court allows residents a way to handle their stress and anxiety, while also providing a place for social interaction with their family, friends, and even the community. So, they applied for a mini-grant and received it!
Balancing Life and Making it Healthy
A basketball court may seem like a small thing, but for the residents at GoForth Recovery, it’s huge. It means a way to be physically active, a place to relieve stress and anxiety, and an activity to do during visits with family and friends.
For the average person, balancing everything life throws at you can be overwhelming, and we often turn to stress eating or some other form of unhealthy coping. For people struggling with addictions, everyday life is even more difficult to handle because they have to relearn how to balance life. GoForth Recovery teaches its residents how to lead a well-balanced and healthy life because when a person in recovery doesn’t adopt healthy habits, they are more likely to relapse. To help prevent relapse, GoForth Recovery provides classes on everything from money management and how to shop with a list to healthy eating and active living.
“Most guys who come in…no one has ever shown them how to have a good, balanced, healthy life. What does healthy look like,” explained Brian Naylor, executive director at GoForth Recovery. “We talk about seven hours of sleep, eating six times a day, what does healthy mean. If I’m getting enough sleep, eating right, and exercising, then I’m more likely to stay in recovery. Nutrition and physical activity is key.”
Naylor explained that their house is a healthy house. He’s witnessed guys turn their lives around and go full force into taking care of their bodies. “It’s amazing to see the success of these guys. When I say guys are drinking shakes at night, I’m watching them use kale, strawberries, bananas, and protein powder; and six months ago, they were shooting meth. That’s healthy. That’s recovery.”
The Power of Community
Before the project began.
Initially, the plan called for clearing enough land for the basketball court, but the vision soon grew to clear an entire lot to make room for future additions, like a pavilion and a playground for residents’ children and visitors.
With any healthy eating and active living project, leveraging funds play an important role in the magnitude and success of the end product. GoForth Recovery had an ambitious job to complete with only $3,500 from Wholespire, which, according to Naylor, only covered about half of the actual costs of the basketball court.
“We were able to get it done for next to nothing, except for gas. We had people donate equipment. We had guys who could operate it. We’re hauling off stuff to the dump. We had the City that donated their time, and they came and filled five or six truckloads of trees and debris.”
Word got out to various community members, businesses, partners, and associates about the basketball court project and the need for help with one slightly large unbudgeted item — dirt, 20 tons of dirt.
“After we graded the land, it required dirt because the land is low. The court system in Spartanburg was demolishing their old courthouse to build a garage. Word got out that we needed dirt. We also had a resident who was working for a local home builder. So for one week, there were close to 30 truckloads…and I’m talking about thousands and thousands of dollars of donations that were coming in. So just the dump trucks and the liability and the dirt, we were able to raise the land .”
Because of GoForth Recovery’s connections and the connections of their residents, they were able to leverage more than $10,000 in in-kind donations and complete their project. As Coretta Scott King once said, “ The greatness of a community is most accurately measured by the compassionate actions of its members.”
Sharing is Caring
Since the completion of the basketball court, Naylor has witnessed increased activity among its residents. Duke Energy installed a light, so the guys take advantage of nighttime hoops.
“We have other people from the recovery community show up to play basketball because there isn’t any other place to go, plus it’s a safe place,” said Naylor. “We have meetings on-site that are open to the public, so after a meeting, people will go outside to congregate and shoot baskets.”
GoForth Recover also shares their new court with a local boys’ home, located one street behind the residence. “They’re over there playing every day on our court. It’s been a good bridge between us and them because we’ve been able to invite them to things like devotion, breakfasts, and some of our group outings — all because of this basketball court.”
In the end, GoForth Recovery got their community basketball court and already prepared space for future additions. But, it didn’t happen without challenges. From tree stump removal, scheduling with partners, debris removal, grading, and weather, their residents rallied behind them and used their connections, skills, and experiences to see the project through to the end.
“The challenges we encountered resulted in an incredible groundswell of resident unity, partner engagement, community involvement, and generous companies that helped us build a community basketball court, which far exceeded our vision in quality when we applied for our initial grant funding from Wholespire,” said Naylor.
GoForth Recovery, a non-profit organization established in 2018, is a men’s addiction recovery program and residential transitional living home for alcoholics and drug addicts. Their six-month residential program provides housing and a structured environment that allows alcoholics and addicts to recover from a hopeless and helpless state of mind and body. Their primary goal is to enable the resident to take responsibility for their recovery and build the foundation for them to be a productive member of their community.
Before
Clearing the land
The City of Spartanburg and a local home builder donated 20 tons of dirt.
For more than 40 years, Beth Barry has played a role in the shaping of South Carolina school districts’ health and wellness initiatives, as well as in the growth of Wholespire, formerly Eat Smart Move More South Carolina, and many other state and community coalitions. Barry recently retired from the Alliance for a Healthier Generation.
As she laughs, Barry says, “My children say they’ll believe it when they see it!” That’s because this retirement marks her second in her long career, and they probably know just how passionate she is about healthy students, health schools, and healthy families.
A native of Columbia, Barry received her bachelor’s degree in health promotion, education, and behavior and her master’s in public health from the University of South Carolina. In fact, she obtained her master’s plus 30, meaning she was eligible for a South Carolina teaching certificate. That’s pretty impressive considering Barry was never really interested in teaching.
In between degrees, she spent eight years at the South Carolina Department of Health and Environmental Control before moving on to Richland School District One for the next 20 years coordinating the South Carolina Department of Education’s first Healthy Schools Grant from the CDC. She retired from Richland One and landed at the Alliance for a Healthier Generation.
That’s where many of us know Barry. Her work took her to school districts across the state as she provided onsite support and training to districts participating in the Alliance’s Healthy Schools and Communities Program. She also helped schools understand and implement evidence-based practices that support healthy eating and active living.
“I realized early on in my career that working in schools is similar to that famous bank robber who replied to a reporter’s inquiry as to why he robbed banks by saying ‘because that’s where the money is’,” says Barry. “Schools are where the young people are. So if we’re focused on prevention, I realized that’s where we needed to be.”
Barry went on to explain that school health initiatives have the potential to impact the most people because they are often one of the largest employers, especially in rural South Carolina. The idea is that when students and staff are exposed to healthy opportunities and choices, then those healthy behaviors at school can impact their families’ health and wellness.
“If we can also impact staff wellness, and perhaps indirectly the wellbeing of the staff’s family, then a focus on wellness in our school communities can really have a significant, positive effect on population health,” explains Barry, “as well as helping schools increase attendance and reach other goals.”
Many public health professionals have had the honor of working with Barry in some capacity, whether it be through Wholespire, state coalitions, grant initiatives, or other collaborative work.
“I met Beth in 2013, soon after starting my position as the School Wellness Consultant at DHEC. She immediately became my mentor starting with road trips to school meetings across the state,” says Erica Ayers. “Beth taught me everything I know about school health, helping me grow from a young novice to the established professional I am today. In return, I taught her how to use the GPS in her phone instead of printed MapQuest directions. Although Beth has retired, her passion lives on in everyone she has worked with over the years.”
She served several years as Wholespire’s second chairman of the Board of Directors. Her role was pivotal as she led staff during a transition between executive directors.
“I have been so impressed with Wholespire over the years. I think the whole evolution that was in health promotion and other aspects of public health, which Wholespire embraced, was to focus on policy, systems, and environmental change,” says Barry. “When I first started my career, the focus was very much on individual behavior change, and there wasn’t much consideration of whether or not individuals had any much less easy access to healthy choices. I think that focus has been transformative and made us so much better in public health and school health. There’s still a lot to be done, but it’s like everything just fell in place. We started looking at things more holistically.”
Over the years, Barry has collaborated with many people on the public health and school health scene. For coalitions that want to work with schools, she says to start with the school district wellness coordinator. Show them you’re there to help and not to hinder their progress. Nurture the relationship and then reveal what you need from them. She advises using this approach because schools are overwhelmed with work and they often get bad press, which makes administrators hesitant to work with outsiders.
Asked how she plans to spend her retirement, her first response was keeping her grandchildren and spending more time with her children. Her second response: “I have signed on with a very, very part-time position with a non-profit.” Barry continues to practice yoga, participate in fitness classes at Drew Wellness Center, and volunteer at her church.
“My career in public and school health has provided a wonderful opportunity that I so appreciate to meet and work with talented, committed partners throughout the state,” says Barry. “I was very fortunate to work statewide for so many years and develop life-long friendships that I appreciate so much. And I’m thrilled that we have such talented, passionate, young professionals in health promotion, public health, and school health who are committed to this work.”
During this time of uncertainty, one Laurens County group has been working hard to become “Champions of Change.”
The Laurens County Bridging the Gap Advocacy HYPE team is composed of students from schools and communities in the Laurens area working as one united team to bring about change in the community.
HYPE stands for Healthy Young People Empowerment. It is a curriculum-based youth engagement program designed by Wholespire (formally Eat Smart, Move More SC) to build the skills of youths to become a greater voice in their communities.
The Laurens County School District Hype team includes middle and high school students from both Laurens and Clinton. They have worked to address the issue of unsafe playgrounds, unsafe passage to schools and parks, and lack of accessibility to fresh vegetables in lower-income communities.
The HYPE team has worked to have pedestrian signs and flashing school lights installed to make the entrance to the school safer. They have worked to restore and update abandoned parks in the area. They have also implemented a fresh vegetable garden to help provide fresh vegetables in lower-income neighborhoods.
People who the group met and worked with include Laurens Mayor Nathan Senn, Waterloo Mayor Barbara A. Smith, Gray Court Mayor Stellartean Jones, Laurens City Council, Laurens County Council, DOT, Laurens Park and Recreation, Churches, Laurens Rotary Clubs, Laurens Exchange Club, and Laurens District 55 School.
Even in times of COVID-19, the team has been able to make change in the community. Though its plans for a countywide Kids Kickball Festival in June 2020 had to be postponed because of CDC guidelines, the group still had a productive year. Members helped improve the community through the renovation of Hickory Tavern Park and by helping restore and repaint the railings and awnings of an older member of the community. They also worked to maintain the garden to provide fresh vegetables for the community. All of this was accomplished while adhering to CDC regulations.
The HYPE team looks forward to making Laurens County a safer and more enjoyable place to live by putting their skills to use and being a greater voice in the community. It hopes to be able to set the plan in motion for the Kickball Festival at the abandoned football field it helped restore. The HYPE team’s next goal is to build a greenhouse to improve the garden’s productivity.
In 2020, Wholespire Richland County, formerly Eat Smart Move More Richland County, collaborated with Koinonia of Columbia and the SC Department of Health and Environmental Control (SCDHEC) to support a local community garden. The community garden was funded by SCDHEC and demonstrated the idea of community and unity by taking a collaborative approach to fulfill the mission that Koinonia of Columbia, an asset-based community development non-profit in the Eau Claire community, had proposed.
The Midlands Community Systems Team at SCDHEC worked with the Central Midlands Council of Governments to provide grant funding to Wholespire Richland County for healthy eating initiatives. Funds supported the Koinonia’s expansion of 8 garden beds to twelve beds, along with supplies for building, gardening, and education.
Tecoria Jones, program manager at Koinonia, is responsible for gardening maintenance and educational programming. She says they intend to continue providing hands-on learning through gardening as part of their afterschool curriculum. “Koinonia is so appreciative to have been a recipient of the Wholespire Richland County funding. We are thankful for the growth in the children and in the community this opportunity has presented.”
It Takes a Village
Children from the Eau Claire Community learn how to plant a garden.
A few years ago, the Lutheran Theological Southern Seminary (LTSS) of Lenoir-Rhyne University began its partnership with the Koinonia to install the first raised beds. Since then, neighboring families, LTSS staff, and volunteers have grown vegetables in the gardens and sold the produce as a fundraiser for Transitions Homeless Center in Columbia. Students of an LTSS ethics class joined in on the collaboration after learning about asset-based community development from Koinonia staff and board members. They also learned gardening through a hands-on harvesting event with children. Ethics students also have participated in Koinonia’s mentoring and afterschool programming.
“As a Christian seminary, our partnership with Koinonia demonstrates a theology that upholds a healing connection to land, food, and neighbors. When we grow good food together, we demonstrate what God’s beloved community can look like in action,” said Dr. Melanie Dobson, assistant professor.
Dr. Dobson went on to explain the partnership allows LTSS to practice being a good neighbor, both in the sharing of land as a resource and in building relationships with local children.
Breaking Ground and Expanding
Wheelchair-accessible garden beds.
In March 2020, Wholespire Richland County, Koinonia and LTSS broke ground on the educational garden expansion. With the approval from LTSS leadership, Koinonia was able to map out and design a layout for the future beds. The funding supported the building of two 12’x4’ beds and two 4’x4’ wheelchair-accessible beds. Wholespire Richland County members, Koinonia staff, and LTSS staff and students rolled their sleeves up to help build the proposed beds.
On Earth Day 2021, Koinonia kids did their spring garden planting. Kids planted herbs, tomatoes, cucumbers, okra, peppers, and squash to the existing spinach, cabbage, and collard green plants.
In Summer 2021, Koinonia is hosting Freedom School, a culture-specific framework sponsored by the Children’s Defense Fund. The children of Koinonia will be seeing themselves in every book they read at Freedom School.
“We will be spotlighting and celebrating black culture. Watching and talking about how things evolve will be an essential conversation,” explained Jones.
The garden will also provide learning opportunities like agriculture, water cycle, ecosystems, and entrepreneurship.
Finishing Touches
Select Health of South Carolina donated a bench for the garden.
Select Health of South Carolina (SHSC), the oldest and largest Medicaid Care organization in South Carolina for over 26 years, got on board and donated a garden bench to support the continuity of community’s mission for sustainable, healthy communities.
“It was our deepest pleasure to support Wholespire Richland County on the 2021 project at Koinonia’s Community Garden, which hosted the Spring Garden Planting on Earth Day,” said Addie Bors, SHSC director of community education and outreach.
Impact of Community Gardens
One of the several tomato plants for the garden.
Community gardens bring positive activity to neighborhoods. They provide a source of fresh, affordable and local produce. Some produce is donated to the community and used in educational and nutritional cooking programs. This garden is an excellent learning tool in Koinonia’s afterschool program. The gardens will provide access to nature, healthy food, green infrastructure, and ecological restoration for the community.
“We are thankful for all of our coalition members and community partners. It is our hope that these children will start having a natural love of gardening. We would love to see their enthusiasm spill over into other school subjects that are related to the garden, like science, art and math,” said TQ Davis, Wholespire Richland County chair.
If you are interested in learning more or joining Wholespire Richland County, please visit our website.
Koinonia of Columbia is a asset-based community development non-profit in the Eau Claire community. Founded by Kelly and David Strum, Koinonia of Columbia sees the power of nature as equally important in the growth and development of children and the village around them. They aim to provide a fruitful and robust nation of good citizens, and they believe children are key to the future.
This last legislative session has been one for the books. From dealing with COVID-19 recovery to very polarizing social issues, the South Carolina General Assembly has been very active. Wholespire has been busy building relationships and fighting for greater access to healthy lifestyles.
For the 2021-2022 Legislative Session, we have been tracking 13 bills in the Senate and House. You can check out the legislative watch list here. Two of these bills passed full House and have moved on to Senate Education Committee.
H3319 – Under this bill, students that are eligible for free and reduced lunch must be offered the same meal as other students and these meals must be offered regardless of if the student owes money for previous meals. Districts cannot penalize students for failing to pay for school lunches and the State Department of Education will develop and provide a model policy and template for school meal debt collection to each school district.
H3006 – Under this bill, school and school districts would be unable to use debt collectors to collect outstanding debts for school lunch or breakfast accounts. It would also prevent these entities from assessing or collecting any interest, fees, or additional charges for outstanding debts.
While the legislature may be out of session until a special session, planned for September & October, Wholespire remains committed to continue the work in the “off-season.” We will continue to build relationships with elected officials and decision makers across the state, and we will be providing resources to our advocates on the ground. Additionally, the Wholespire team has developed a 3-class advocacy training series for our chapters and partners – Government 101, Advocacy 101, & Relationship Building 101.
We look forward to sharing more with you and advocating to make South Carolina a healthier state. Please contact us at info@wholespire.org if you would like to learn more about our advocacy efforts.
How do you pull off a first virtual conference during times of uncertainty without pulling your hair out? Patiently…very patiently. That was the mindset of Wholespire staff who were planning the virtual Leadership Summit for Healthy Communities + Youth Edition and learning how to execute a virtual conference.
At the direction of the Summit Planning Committee, Wholespire staff embarked on its first ever virtual conference in December 2020 with the search for a virtual platform. While virtual conferences were still new for many organizations at the time, it was just as new for platform developers. But, staff managed to find a platform that worked out fairly well in the end.
For the next four-and-a-half months, the work began. From pulling together the call for speakers to thinking about fun and engaging things to do, staff were constantly brainstorming and finalizing the details.
“I think the hardest part of planning a virtual conference is remembering what our in-person conference offered attendees,” said Brandie Freeman, communications and marketing manager at Wholespire. “I had to keep reminding myself that we could still provide networking opportunities, physical activity breaks, and interaction with the speakers. We just had to figure out how to do that.”
In the end, it all came together with two intimidating things – technology and the unknown. During the two half-days on May 12-13, staff came together for the first time in over a year to run the virtual Leadership Summit + Youth Edition.
“While scattered about our office building, we stayed pretty busy greeting speakers behind the scenes on Zoom, clicking buttons to play videos, going live for some of us, and engaging with attendees through session chat boxes,” said Meg Stanley, executive director at Wholespire. “It was quite the fun yet uncertain scene, but we made it through with flying colors.”
Evaluations seemed to repeat some common thoughts: ease of use, accessibility, inclusivity, engaging sessions, great speakers, and chat box features to name a few. Of those who completed an evaluation, results were:
54% rated the Summit excellent; 38% good; and 4% average.
94% said they would attend the Summit again.
74% said they would recommend the Summit to a colleague or friend.
The Summit featured three keynote speakers: Gullah/Geechee Nation Chieftess Queen Quet on May 12; Dr. Kathryn Silva Hyde on May 13; and By the Hand Club for Kids & Austin Harvest youth on May 13. Attendees gave high marks on all three keynote speakers:
62% were very satisfied with Queen Quet.
92% were very satisfied with Dr. Kathryn Silva Hyde.
76% were very satisfied with By the Hand Club for Kids & Austin Harvest youth.
During the call for speakers and conference registration processes, Wholespire staff ensured speaker and audience demographics were asked to help ensure the event would be diverse, equitable, and representative of the communities served. While demographic questions were optional, a surprising number of people completed them. Here’s a glimpse into what it revealed:
56% of registrants were first-time attendees.
75% represented South Carolina, while 25% represented other states.
1% represented the Buddhist community.
5% represented the LGBTQ+ community.
1.1% represented the Hispanic, Latinx or Spanish Origin ethnicities.
“With this and much more audience demographic information in hand, we can use it to increase outreach and partnerships with specific communities and groups around the state,” said Stanley. “We can even increase inclusivity on our social media platforms by promoting health observances, events, and webinars that speak directly to these types of groups.”
So, what’s next for the Leadership Summit for Healthy Communities? The planning committee will reconvene soon to determine the 2022 date and platform. All data collected in evaluations will be used to ensure another great event. If you would like to join the planning committee, email brandie@wholespire.org.
Today, the park equity movement in the U.S. is at a turning point. Parks and other green spaces are crucial for the health and wellbeing of communities—a fact made even clearer during the pandemic. But not all communities have access to these vital resources. Correcting inequities demands advocates’ utmost attention, urgency, and action. A new approach to achieving park equity can unlock transformation and usher in an era in which African American, Latino, and low-income urban communities are fair, just, and green.
Across the U.S., a growing number of jurisdictions are adopting park and green space equity policies. These include public finance measures that have an equity focus, park agency organizational changes, documentation of green space needs and inequities, joint use policies for school yards, land use policies that facilitate access to green space, policies and ordinances requiring community engagement for park development, and anti-displacement provisions within green space equity initiatives. But in many low-income communities of color, longstanding green space inequities remain. A growing movement of park equity advocates—including community members exercising their own power—is working to change that.
In the new paper, Changing the Landscape: People, Parks, and Power, Prevention Institute and Alessandro Rigolon of the University of Utah propose an approach to park and green space equity that prioritizes investing in the capacity of people closest to the problem so that they can drive policy and systems changes that will achieve population-level impacts. Support for this paper was provided by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.
Key takeaways of Changing the Landscape: People, Parks, and Power are below. Please join us for a free webinar on Wednesday, July 28 at 10:00am Pacific Time to learn about these points in more depth and hear an update on the planning of RWJF’s new national funding initiative on park and green space equity.
Urban parks and green spaces protect public health by providing opportunities for physical activity, time in nature, social connection, and respite. Parks also filter air, remove pollution, cool temperatures, and filter stormwater.
African Americans, Latinos, and people who live in low-income, urban neighborhoods have less access to parks and green spaces than people who live in more affluent or predominantly white communities.
These inequities are the product of policies and practices like residential segregation, redlining, racially biased planning decisions, and exclusionary zoning, as well as problematic narratives and ways of working in the green space field that have often excluded or tokenized communities of color.
The traditional approach to addressing these inequities has focused on developing new parks or green infrastructure projects or improving existing projects. While project development is crucial, a sole focus on individual projects fails to address the existing system that produces—and will continue to produce—green space inequities.
To address the root causes of green space inequities, the parks and green space field should embrace upstream policy and systems change.
Power drives policy and systems change. Building the skills, capacity, and power of residents who live in park-poor neighborhoods is key to achieving green space equity.
Park and green space inequities will persist until the systems, policies, power dynamics, and narratives that produced these inequities in the first place are redesigned to produce equitable outcomes. By embracing the approach described in Changing the Landscape: People, Parks, and Power, advocates and jurisdictions can solve pervasive, structural inequities and support healthy, vibrant communities.
Dr. Megan Weis receiving the Gerry Sue Arnold Alumni Award during the annual hooding ceremony.
Wholespire Board of Directors Vice Chairman Dr. Megan Weis was recently awarded the Gerry Sue Arnold Alumni Award during the annual hooding ceremony at the University of South Carolina Arnold School of Public Health. The award is given to one alumni each year whose work has both made a difference to the public health profession and in the health of an identified community or population.
Dr. Weis has served on the Wholespire board of directors since 2017, and she has contributed vastly to the growth and sustainability of the non-profit organization. In the absence of an executive director, Dr. Weis was part of a team of board members who provided guidance and leadership to the Wholespire staff.
Dr. Weis is a two-time alumna of the Arnold School’s Department of Health Promotion, Education, and Behavior – graduating with a Master of Public Health in 2002 and then a Doctor of Public Health in 2012. Between her degrees, Weis worked for the South Carolina Department of Health and Environmental Control ‘s (SC DHEC) Pregnancy and Risk Assessment Monitoring System and Injury and Violence Prevention division.
In 2007 – the same year she began her doctoral studies – Weis co-founded the South Carolina Institute of Medicine and Public Health, where she worked for more than 12 years. In 2020, she joined the UofSC School of Medicine as a research assistant professor and as director of community engagement with the SC Center for Rural and Primary Healthcare. In addition to serving on numerous committees and task forces to improve health throughout the state, Weis has taught many courses as an Arnold School adjunct faculty member.
For her efforts, Weis has been recognized with the Health Education Professional of the Year Award (South Carolina Association for the Advancement of Health Education, 2007), the President’s Award (SC Public Health Association (SCPHA), 2010) for establishing a student forum that later became the student section, and the Lucinda Thomas Award for Outstanding Contributions in Community Health (SCPHA, 2013). In both 2007 and 2017, Weis received SCPHA’s Michael D. Jarrett Excellence in Customer Service Award, and in 2019, she won the James A. Hayne Award and The Voice of Public Health Award from SCPHA.
Eat Smart Move More SC, a statewide nonprofit leader in increasing access to healthy eating and active living choices in communities across South Carolina, announced today it is changing its name to Wholespire. The name change comes with a complete rebranding, including a new logo and tagline, and was unveiled to over 200 stakeholders and attendees during the organization’s annual leadership conference.
According to Meg Stanley, Eat Smart Move More’s executive director, the rebrand’s purpose is to more effectively illuminate its advocacy and support of local initiatives that inspire wellness in all communities.
“The name Wholespire reflects how coming together to increase access to wellness in communities creates unification and wholeness,” explains Stanley. “It conveys our work to inspire wellness across our state in an equitable manner.” “Our new name and look capture our efforts to bring about lasting and healthy change for so many who aspire to wellness but lack access to the key components of health. It’s a refresh on our goal to make whole health a possibility for all South Carolinians as we inform, engage and influence decision-makers to include health in policy decisions.”
Eat Smart Move More SC worked with Trio Solutions Inc., a Mount Pleasant-based marketing agency, to conduct research to evaluate and launch its new brand. The new brand project was one of five key initiatives in the nonprofit’s strategic plan and focuses on the organization’s evolving public health work and leadership position as an advocate for collaborative initiatives that change the makeup of South Carolina for the better.
Since 2007, Wholespire, formerly Eat Smart Move More SC, has brought lasting and healthy change to communities across South Carolina through advocacy, youth engagement and community action. Wholespire, a statewide nonprofit, focuses on inspiring wellness through its 26 chapters across 31 counties, collectively impacting 93 percent of South Carolina’s population.
