Group Members: Dani Free, Percy Filizetti, Ava Chang, Danish Adam, Cecelia Wood, Zoe Owens
The issue in our community is the decline of nutritional value in American food products. America does not offer equitable economic opportunity to afford whole foods that provide proper nutrition to the everyday consumer. Working middle class Americans have more access to processed foods or foods with lower nutritional value.
America’s nutrition is continuing to decline. The United States is ranking 19th place with the percentage of 42.74 obesity rate for both men and women out of 200 countries (World Obesity Federation Global Obesity Observatory). 73% of the US food supply is highly processed (Curtin; 2023). Our group has chosen to address this problem concerning our own personal health, our families and friends’ health, and the health of our community.
The solution criteria for the Small Wins group project is that it must be the achievement of a goal or task consistent with the definition of a group from our text. That is, the project includes three or more persons interacting who both influence and are influenced by one another. (Rothwell, 2019, p. 24). The Small Wins project must include a community service component, with our group determining what is both our “community” and who is being “served.” However, the project must have an actionable activity that is conducted by all the members.
The Small Win should be a complex task that requires more than 1 person to accomplish (a basic definition of the purpose of a group), that it can be accomplished within the timeline of 4 weeks, and that involves all members of the group in the Small Wins solution. In addition, it needs to be consistent with the college’s guidelines for the safety and security of our students. Please keep this in mind as you develop ideas.
Our group chose to design and create a recipe book containing healthy alternatives to processed foods that are also budget friendly. We decided to create a recipe book over other options because it’s an easily accessible, educational, and fun way to improve your diet. When choosing what avenue to take, we opted to create an online and physical version of our booklet because if we only created an online version – e.g. a video format- we would exclude audiences without internet access.
Our group started researching negative effects of consuming foods lacking in nutritional value and processed foods. We then brainstormed different base foods that are budget friendly and hold nutritional value. Using, process of elimination we came down to six different food options. We then distributed among each other to find healthy and home-made recipes. After that, the recipe book was then started. Later to be printed and uploaded to a pdf, for physical and online accessibility.
The project moved a little slow at first but after focusing, it was moving along successfully. Within the two hours we met every week, we were following our project plan well and completing all our tasks in the end. Only a few adjustments were made to our plan because some things needed to be done before others. Group participation went well when we were assigning recipe research and design ideas. Everyone contributed on each assignment, splitting the work up evenly.
evaluation of the success of the project AND an evaluation of the success of the group.
Rothwell, J.D. (2019). In mixed company: Communicating in small groups and teams (10th ed.). Oxford University Press.
Ranking (% obesity by country). World Obesity Federation Global Obesity Observatory. (n.d.). https://data.worldobesity.org/rankings/
Ashley Curtin, (2023, August 15). Ashley Curtin. Nation of Change. https://www.nationofchange.org/2023/08/15/new-research-reveals-73-percent-of-food-supply-is-ultra-processed-in-us/