Wholespire is thrilled to announce that The Healthy Young People Empowerment (HYPE) Project has been honored with the Empowering Justice Stellar Award for making a significant difference in the lives of young leaders and the communities they serve. This award recognizes our dedication to empowering youth, promoting leadership, and fostering sustainable community change, and it is a testament to the hard work and collaboration of our team, partners, and supporters.
“Thank you to the Empowering Justice Charitable Foundation for this incredible honor. We look forward to continuing our mission-driven focus to increase access to healthy choices for all people and to giving youth leadership skills to become successful community leaders that drive sustainable change,” said Meg Stanley, executive director at Wholespire.
In honor of their late daughter, First Lieutenant Justice R. Stewart, Woody and Tia Jones founded the Empowering Justice Charitable Foundation to raise funds and support organizations that promote pathways out of poverty through empowering youth, supporting authentic opportunities for leadership, promoting youth advocacy, promoting military alliances in the community, and strengthening communities through youth voice and expression.
The Foundation also supports college ROTC programs to honor the sacrifices service members have made and to assist in recruitment and retention efforts to create and maintain a diverse officer corps. To learn more about First Lieutenant Justice R. Stewart, the Foundation and its annual 5K run, visit their website.
The Louisiana 4-H Teens Leading Change team with Jamaius White (middle).
The Louisiana State University (LSU) AgCenter and Louisiana 4-H are collaborating with Wholespire to implement The Health Young People Empowerment (HYPE) Project in two parishes over the next four years. LSU AgCenter included funding for The HYPE Project® in their application for a USDA Children, Youth, and Families at Risk grant to engage youth leaders in meaningful community change while developing leadership skills.
“This five-year grant focuses on Jefferson and Orleans parishes, but we hope to expand to other parishes down the road,” said Jessica Stroop, research associate at the LSU AgCenter. “The specific projects will be up to the youth but will broadly focus on systemic issues related to nutrition or physical activity. We also hope to see youth leaders develop skills in presentations, assessments, collaboration, and organization.”
Jamaius White, program manager of The HYPE Project, recently trained the Louisiana 4-H agents on the curriculum in New Orleans, walking them through various activities and discussions that youth will participate in. The LSU AgCenter chose both Advisor Training and Train the Trainer packages based on their approach to implementing The HYPE Project. Some agents will use the traditional model of implementing the HYPE curriculum themselves (Advisor Training), while other agents will use the Train the Trainer model to train others on how to implement the curriculum.
“We’re excited to be providing technical assistance to the Louisiana 4-H agents and helping them understand the curriculum, the operational side of managing a HYPE team, as well as other technical assistance needs, they may have,” said Jamaius White, The HYPE Project® program manager. “I think LSU AgCenter has a strong plan for implementing HYPE in these schools, and I don’t see them needing much assistance.”
Louisiana 4-H is the largest youth development program with clubs and groups in all 64 parishes, territorial divisions similar to counties. Jefferson and Orleans parishes, two urban areas with diverse populations and cultures, were chosen not only to develop youth leadership skills but to also develop 4-H urban programming. 4-H is known for livestock showing competitions and other agriculture-related activities in rural areas, but Louisiana 4-H leaders want to reach youth in urban parishes too. One way they’re doing that is through their Teens Leading Change program, also know as The HYPE Project.
White (not pictured) walked the 4-H agents through The HYPE Project curriculum.
In South Carolina, Wholespire has historically worked with youth-led organizations and groups based on funding sources and directives. LSU AgCenter is the first state-level organization to purchase The HYPE Project curriculum package and the first to implement the curriculum in schools. The key component to their approach is working with a lead teacher, who will be the advisor to the students.
“The school administration has been fantastic, and I’m lucky to have my lead teacher. She really is so passionate about these kids and the program and what we can do,” said Sabrina Hoffmeister, assistant extension agent 4-H Youth Development for Jefferson Parish.
The lead teacher will help run the Teens Leading Change program composed of ten high school seniors. This model is being used in both Orleans and Jefferson parishes, however, this article provides insight into the Jefferson Parish implementation. Information on the Orleans Parish implementation is not available at this time, however, keep in mind that implementing one model in two high schools may not run the same way based on unexpected hurdles and changing situations.
At Riverdale High School in Jefferson Parish, an economically disadvantaged public school (based on 86% of the student population qualifying for free or reduced school meals), Lead Teacher Lauren Broadway is an English instructor in the International Baccalaureate (IB) Diploma Program, an academic program that addresses intellectual, social, emotional and physical well-being of students. She has an established relationship with the IB students, who make up the Teens Leading Change program.
“We considered interviewing students to identify the right candidates, but we thought about the lead teacher. She knows these kids and sees them every day. She’s the one that has chosen the ten students based on their capstone project and their desire to make the community better,” said Hoffmeister.
4-H agents try out the Community Web of Support activity.
A core component of the IB Diploma Program is the completion of a Creativity, Activity, Service (CAS) project, also referred to as a capstone project, that demonstrates the students’ knowledge and skills. According to the IB Diploma Program website, a CAS project can address any single strand of CAS, or combine two or all three strands of creativity, activity and service.
The advantages of implementing The HYPE Project at Riverdale High School are extraordinarily unique because of the IB Diploma Program, its alignment with the HYPE curriculum, and the knowledge and experience of the lead teacher. Perhaps one standout advantage is that the IB students already know about policy, systems and environments (PSE).
“My group of students have already taken a PSE class, which is super helpful. They already know those beginning steps of the curriculum, but we will do a little refresh,” said Hoffmeister. “Then, we’ll quickly move into the act phase of the HYPE curriculum and get the ball rolling in September.”
In addition to Hoffmeister being the point person for the Teens Leading Change program in Jefferson Parish, her team includes Nutrition Agent Shawn Verbeten and Assistant Extension Agent Courtney Budenich. The Jefferson Parish 4-H agents will manage their Teens Leading Change program and provide technical assistance, or guidance, to the lead teacher and interact with the students too.
The Riverdale High School IB Diploma Program seniors will begin their HYPE journey within days or weeks of this posting. Based on the information learned by Wholespire, LSU AgCenter and Louisiana 4-H have set them up for success with a well thought out plan, contingencies for roadblocks, and a timeline that could avoid Mardi Gras interruptions.
If you are interested in implementing The HYPE Project in your state, school, community or youth-led organization, visit our website and contact us.
For this blog post, we’re organizing project examples by these categories: Activity-Friendly Communities, Access to Healthy Food, Healthy School Environments and Youth Engagement.Staff share their expertise, or technical assistance, within several sectors of community: municipalities, state agencies, coalitions, schools, faith-based organizations and other nonprofit organizations.
Below is an incompletelist of community-level projectsWholespirehas supported with mini-grants. The list features examples of PSE projects implemented by various communities across South Carolina. All focus areas marked with an asterisk (*) indicatea level of partnership and collaboration with local government and regulatory agenciesrequired to complete the projects.
Activity-Friendly Communities
Activity-friendly communities are vibrant spaceswhere people of all ages and abilities can easily and safely enjoy walking, bicycling, rolling and other forms of active transportationand recreation.Communities must be thoughtfully designed and include policies, systems, and environmental supports that allow daily active transportation and recreation.
Focus Area
Project/Tactic
Items Funded
Bicycle and Pedestrian Routes and Trails
Provide adequate signage to improve pedestrian safety
Safety signs, paint and other tools
Install way-finding signage
Signs, posts, hardware and installation costs
Create maps of community/ neighborhood walking and biking routes
Purchase outdoor exercise system equipment/stations
Parks, Playgrounds and Other Recreational Facilities
Provide bike racks at recreational facilities, schools, and businesses
Purchase and installation costs
Provide benches at parks, paved walking paths, playgrounds, ADA picnic tables, etc.
Purchase and installation costs
Improve park/recreational facilities
Recreational equipment such as basketball goals, soccer goals, playground equipment, balls, and other needs
Create inclusive play spaces for people with disabilities
Sensory panels, inclusive swings, and other inclusive play equipment; ramps, braille and sign language signs; accessible drinking water fountains/water bottle refill stations
Improve accessibility and ADA compliance
Rubber mats for playgrounds, ADA signs, ramps, and other needs
Create or upgrade a community basketball court
Land grading, concrete, basketball goals, paint, stencils, supplies to repair cracks on surface
Create a disc golf course
Disc golf backets, disc golf frisbees, equipment needed for installation
Paint and supplies for curbs, crosswalks and other safety areas
Effective Student Pick-up and Drop-off Design
Signs to define areas in drop-off and pick-up zones and explain their proper use
Enhanced Visibility Crosswalks/ re-painting of crosswalks leading to the school
Stencils, paint, supplies
Crossing Guard Supplies/Safety Equipment
Reflective vests, stop/go handheld signs, portable stop/go/slow signs and other safety equipment
Improve school traffic safety during drop off and pick up
Supplies for road surface markings, curb markings, delineators, colored pavements, and traffic channelizing devices, lights for portico
Access to Drinking Water
Ensure drinking water is available in public spaces
Water bottle refill stations, accessible drinking water fountains, water fountains featuring a dog bowl
Access to Healthy Food
Access to healthy food refers to the availability, affordability, and consistency of foods and beverages that promote well-being and prevent chronic disease. Areas that lack access to healthy foods are known as food deserts. Ensuring access to healthy food is an important element of an equitable food system, one in which those most vulnerable and those living in low-income neighborhoods, communities of color, and rural and tribal communities can fully participate, prosper, and benefit.
Focus Area
Project/Tactic
Items Funded
Farmer’s Markets
Establish new farmers’ markets
Sandwich boards, employee/farmer aprons, SNAP/WIC processing equipment and Wi-Fi hot spots, signage, SNAP/WIC promotional signs
Increase access for people with disabilities
Paint and signs for parking, materials and supplies for curb ramps
Mobile markets
Accept SNAP, WIC, Senior SNAP and Healthy Bucks
SNAP/WIC processing equipment and Wi-Fi hotspots, SNAP/WIC promotional signs
Community Gardens
Create or expand a network of community gardens
Materials to build gardening beds: lumber, cement blocks, planting soil, mulch; Water meter and backflow gauge, signage, Gardening tools (rakes, hoes, etc.), tiller
Other food access projects
Provide free gleaned produce stations at a local, public facility
Shelves, baskets, bins and other food storage supplies, chalkboard signs
Healthy School Environments
Promoting healthy eating and active living in the school environment is crucial for the overall well-being of students and staff. When students have nutritious meals and are physically active, their performance and attention span reflect those elements of healthy school environments. A healthy school environment applies to the indoor and outdoor environments of the school and the surrounding environments.
Paint and supplies for curbs, crosswalks and other safety areas
Effective Student Pick-up and Drop-off Design
Signs to define areas in drop-off and pick-up zones and explain their proper use
Enhanced Visibility Crosswalks/ re-painting of crosswalks leading to the school
Stencils, paint, supplies
Crossing Guard Supplies/Safety Equipment
Reflective vests, stop/go handheld signs, portable stop/go/slow signs and other safety equipment
Improve school traffic safety during drop off and pick up
Supplies for road surface markings, curb markings, delineators, colored pavements, and traffic channelizing devices, lights for portico
Access to Drinking Water
Retrofit and install safe water sources
Water refill stations, water fountains, accessible water fountains
Transform the physical environment to increase students’ PA and other pro-social learning and play behaviors
Improve outdoor playground equipment
Purchase PA equipment, such as slides, swings, ladders, and various climbing structures for students to interact with; upgrade basketball goals
Increase the variety of outdoor play options
Add painted play spaces or markings to the playground
Create active pathways in hallways and walkways
Stencils, paint and other materials
Create inclusive spaces for people with disabilities
Purchase grip volleyballs, ringing volleyballs and other specialty balls and play equipment for kids with disabilities, smooth surfaces likes rubber mats
Create an Outdoor Classroom
Picnic tables, benches, and other materials
Youth Engagement (The HYPE Project®)
Engaging youth in community health improvement can be a driving force for change. Through the Healthy Young People Empowerment (HYPE) Project®, youth develop critical thinking skills, build relationships with community stakeholders and have fun learning practical ways to create policy, systems and environmental (PSE) changes. Youth can implement any of the projects mentioned above; however, below are examples of HYPE civic action projects Wholespire has funded.
Focus Area
Project/Tactic
Items Funded
School-based PSE Projects
Mobile Breakfast Carts
Food cart, wrapping for cart
Improve pedestrian and bicycling safety of students
Supplies for conducting a walkability assessment
Community-based PSE Projects
Update a local park
Benches, trash receptables, benches, paint and supplies, park signs
Upgrade a community basketball court
Basketball goals, paint, stencils, supplies to repair cracks on surface
Playground improvements
Volleyball net, disability swings, trash receptables, benches, paint and supplies, park signs
According to the U.S. Census Bureau, 43 percent of children under the age of 18 in Barnwell County live below the poverty level. Because of their parents’ economic status, those children face more health disparities and inequities than others. For the majority of those children, it means living in affordable housing, also known as public housing.
Affordable housing communities can be found in almost every area of South Carolina, and Barnwell County is no exception. You’ve seen them around—complexes of multi-unit apartments with some green spaces but no visible outdoor recreational structures and no park within a safe walking distance. The HYPE team in Barnwell County saw the same thing. The lack of playgrounds in multiple affordable housing communities concerned them enough to do something about it.
Key partners were rounded up.
A HYPE team member helps with the obstacle course setup.
As soon as the HYPE team decided to focus on improving access to outdoor recreation in affordable housing communities, they turned to the South Carolina Regional Housing Authority No. 3 (SCRH3), the organization tasked with managing public housing and connecting residents to community resources. Getting buy-in from SCRH3 was integral to the success of the project.
“Our kids need something to do. You know, society complains a lot about this particular population, and I mean those residents who live in low-income housing, but they don’t provide any resources,” said Lisa Creech, resident opportunity and self-sufficiency service coordinator at SCRH3. “If you don’t want them to do something in particular, you have to provide another outlet, another resource for them. And I think that’s where we were lacking.”
Prior to joining SCRH3, Creech worked at an agency that wanted to partner with local housing and provide some recreation resources to the kids. As the HYPE team entered the picture, the affordable housing communities received basketball courts. But according to Creech, the kids wanted more.
Creech said on partnering with the HYPE team, “Many of these properties don’t have playgrounds, and for the ones that do have the basketball courts now, that’s all the kids have. So, we were really hoping to give them an opportunity to just be kids.”
Barnwell youth leaders take action.
Children play with the parachute as one boy has fun with tug of war.
With funding from Wholespire, Barnwell County HEALing Partners (funding from Healthy People, Healthy Carolinas) and other leveraged sources, youth were able to follow The HYPE Project process of observing their community, collecting data, and choosing their project focus area. They chose to increase access to physical activity in six local affordable housing communities located in Barnwell, Williston and Blackville. The team relied on a needs assessment they conducted the previous year to determine what type of physical activity to provide through their project.
They already knew SCRH3 and Barnwell County HEALing Partners hosted a field day event, which was successful but needed a little work. So, they analyzed the needs assessment and community feedback from the event and decided to enhance the activities of the field day and take it to multiple affordable housing communities during spring break.
“I thought it was very important that the youth take the lead on this project, and they did so well. I’m so pleased that I did not even imagine they would take it on the way that they did. But I think it’s because we made them understand that this is your project, and I think that message took it to another level,” said Pamela McKnight, HPHC project coordinator at Axis 1 Center of Barnwell, the fiscal agent for Barnwell County HEALing Partners.
The HYPE team planned the improvements from start to finish, adding additional (and traditional) field day games, purchasing recreation equipment, increasing the frequency from once a year to twice a year, and creating a HYPE Tour that would take the event to multiple affordable housing communities in the county.
The obstacle course tested everyone’s agility with the use of pool noodles, cones and other affordable materials.
“We brought out all the games that we played as kids for Field Day. We had tug of war; jump rope, hula hoops; obstacle courses; the large parachute—all things field day. The kids came out in droves, and they had a great time. We provided healthy snacks, and they got to be kids,” said Creech.
Not only was the purpose to increase access to physical activity, but it was also to give those particular community members a sense of community and belonging.
“I think it actually gave the parents and the children the opportunity to do something together because, when you think about it, everybody’s lives are busy. You have parents working long hours, and then you may have an older sibling taking care of the younger kids while the parent is working,” said Susan Ingram, HYPE advisor and project coordinator at AXIS 1 Center of Barnwell. ”But this project allows the parents and the children to play together. It was a beautiful thing to see.
In addition to field day games, McKnight said the HYPE Tour also included arts and crafts, health and wellness information from local vendors, and healthy snacks. “We also use that opportunity to show parents how easy it is to have a nutritious snack, and the children loved it. We did fruit kebabs with yogurt, and the children absolutely loved it. Nine times out of ten, none of those children had fruit or yogurt.”
Leveraging the HYPE Project for a greater impact.
Tug of war was popular among everyone.
Since the HYPE Tour, Creech says that she has noticed a change. “Since the field day, I do see the kids out playing, but it would be really nice to have some permanent structures for them.”
When you leverage a policy, systems and environmental change project for a greater impact, it means you influence additional change. You brought more attention to the needs of the community, and another entity or partner is investing in the community’s future. The HYPE team in Barnwell County did just that. Their actions and concerns about the lack of outdoor recreational structures in affordable housing communities put a brighter light on the situation.
According to McKnight, there have been conversations about adding some permanent structures to some of the low-income properties. Things could change for the children, and the HYPE team would play a role. Barnwell County HEALing Partners is considering building naturalized play areas on the properties because, through this project, they realized that not all of the affordable housing communities have areas for children to play. The health coalition continues to research naturalized play areas.
“Another project we were looking at in concert with the Housing Authority is sidewalk play,” says McKnight. “We want to make it permanent. So, permanent sidewalk directives like do jumping jacks or do hopscotch on the sidewalks to give children something that they could do.”
The HYPE team has inspired Barnwell County HEALing Partners to do more to improve access to physical activity throughout the county. There are tons of ideas, big and small, and several larger projects in the making. It’s safe to say that the movers and shakers of all ages in Barnwell County are doing some pretty big things that other communities can learn from, and a lot of it involves youth engagement.
The physical environment is a key tool for living a healthy lifestyle! Learn from Brandie Freeman, Wholespire Marketing and Communications Manager, and Jamaius White, The HYPE Project Program Manager, as they discuss community and school projects that shape the physical environment. This webinar will explore advocacy efforts surrounding schools, the Healthy Young People Empowerment Project (HYPE!), and funding opportunities for PSE change!
