Community Support
Kinston’s Southeast Elementary School has taken their honored role as a model school for Project Fit America on October 18th, 2013. Lenoir County is leading the way with the first Project Fit America school in North Carolina east of Greensboro. Never before has there been so many out-of-shape, overweight and inactive American children. Since 1980, childhood obesity has tripled according to the US Surgeon General’s Report. Lenoir County is especially vulnerable to poor health, ranking as the 94th of the 100 NC counties in overall health status according to the 2013 County Health Rankings.
Project Fit America is a school-based fitness education program that includes fitness interventions with structured playground equipment and a creative curriculum, including fitness games and challenges. Teacher training and classroom instruction on topics such as smoking intervention, nutrition and understanding your body are part of the evidence based national program. Principal Nakia McCall shares, "With Project Fit America, we are required to get a baseline fitness level for each student, so that we can implement the program and measure our success at intervals." Regular recognition and rewards will be incorporated into the fitness program.
The project is a joint effort of the Lenoir Memorial Foundation, Lenoir Memorial, and Southeast Elementary School. Constance Hengel, Director of Community Programming and Development said, "This project works well with our efforts to improve obesity measures locally and we have worked with the Lenoir County Childhood Obesity Prevention Task Force to target a couple of schools as we develop initiatives in this area." The playground equipment was delivered in August and is being installed by Kinston/Lenoir County Parks and Recreation.
Project Fit America is a school-based fitness education program that includes fitness interventions with structured playground equipment and a creative curriculum, including fitness games and challenges. Teacher training and classroom instruction on topics such as smoking intervention, nutrition and understanding your body are part of the evidence based national program. Principal Nakia McCall shares, "With Project Fit America, we are required to get a baseline fitness level for each student, so that we can implement the program and measure our success at intervals." Regular recognition and rewards will be incorporated into the fitness program.
The project is a joint effort of the Lenoir Memorial Foundation, Lenoir Memorial, and Southeast Elementary School. Constance Hengel, Director of Community Programming and Development said, "This project works well with our efforts to improve obesity measures locally and we have worked with the Lenoir County Childhood Obesity Prevention Task Force to target a couple of schools as we develop initiatives in this area." The playground equipment was delivered in August and is being installed by Kinston/Lenoir County Parks and Recreation.
The Hand-in-Hand program is a partnership between Queen Street Church and Southeast Elementary School. The two are both located in downtown Kinston in close proximity to each other. Through this partnership QSUMC provides one-to-one reading, furnish a clothing closet and provide monthly birthday parties for the students. The teachers are given supplemental school supplies for the students in need and welcome back cookie party for the teachers. Additionally, each staff member has a prayer partner that prays for them daily and receives a card of encouragement monthly. They provide a staff appreciation luncheon twice a year to celebrate the commitment of the staff at Southeast Elementary.
Special Thanks from Southeast School
Thanks so much for the good people at Queen Street Methodist Church for their time, donations, and expressions of love to Southeast School. Once again, they have donated school supplies for students in our community who lack the funds to obtain these on their own. We are forever indebted to Queen St. for their thoughtfulness. It Takes A Village!