Tackling Adolescent Obesity Project
Nearly 1 in 4 adolescents are overweight or obese in Europe. Tackling obesity is not as simple as telling people to exercise more or eat less. Obesity is the problem of a society full of aggressive marketing, body shaming and bullying towards obese people. This is why the TAO project was created with the support of Erasmus +. Meet TAO and LAMY in this video 🙂
« At the core of eating disorders is silence, and this silence must be broken. Starting with us! »
« Il cuore dei disturbi alimentari è il silenzio, e questo silenzio va rotto. A partire da noi ! »
MARINA BIGLIA
The TAO Project
In 2018, SAFE was selected to receive an Erasmus+ grant, which has allowed it to implement an educational project aimed at tackling adolescent obesity within the European Union. The project runs for two and a half years from September 2018 until February 2021.
The consortium
The consortium encompasses 10 partners stemming from 5 EU Member States that have very complementary profiles.
Indeed, partners are coming from very diverse horizons such as European networks specialised in the field of nutrition and adolescent obesity like the European Childhood Obesity Group (ECOG) or Safe Food Advocacy Europe (SAFE), Italian and German national obese patient associations (AdipositasHilfe Deutschland, Amici Obesi), the Medical Faculty of Rzeszow, an association that gathers nutritionist and dietitians expert on plant-based diets (SONVE), a psychologist expert on obesity-related matters (Emotifood) and, last but not least, three high schools in which trainings will be tested (Liceo Scientifico Enrico Fermi and Doukas School).
The intellectual outputs
In order to raise awareness regarding obesity-related problems in adolescents and their families, the project partners will first work together to create three intellectual outputs covering nutritional education:
Student’s Nutrition Handbook
The handbook is downloadable for free in:
An online platform
The website is a useful tool for accompanying students during the implementation of the trainings. There are lots of recipes, quizzes, and an interactive map to pursue the training experiment.
Teacher’s Nutritional Education Handbook
It helps teachers running the trainings with already-made lesson plans and create “safe-zones” where students can communicate freely. In addition, there is a specific section for teachers on the TAO website which is called “Teacher’s room“. It is a space where pedagogical materials are gathered and a chat gives the possibility to teachers around the European Union to exchange their good practices.
The manual is downloadable for free here:
Implementation of the trainings
Once these three intellectual outputs are created and approved by all partners, they will be translated in French, Greek, and Italian to be implemented as pilot training in the partner schools. The students participating in the test period will be encouraged to come up with projects, which will be evaluated by the partners.
The testing period has begun from January 2021 to March 2021 in the partner schools: Liceo Scientifico Enrico Fermi (Aversa, Italy) and Doukas School (Maroussi, Greece). It has involved around 150 adolescents aged between 16 to 18 years old and 3 to 4 teachers per school.
The training is aimed at being implemented in many school establishments in Europe. If you are interested in implementing the TAO training, send an email at euaffairs@safefoodadvocacy.eu
Dissemination & Sustainability
Following the test period, the educational material will be made accessible to all students and teachers of partner schools. Moreover, in order to reach more schools and implement the project at a broader scale, the materials is currently being translated into Polish and will all be freely accessible on https://meet-tao.eu/.
A virtual conference, “Tackling Adolescent Obesity : How to make a shift towards healthier behaviors“, has been successfully organised on February 26, 2021 to disseminate the project intellectual outputs and training at partner schools. The event attract 200 participants from all over Europe and also other parts of the world, including Belgium, Portugal, UK, Greece, Italy, Bulgaria, Singapore, Mexico, to name but a few. It was a great opportunity to discuss the challenges and opportunities to tackle adolescent obesity in Europe at multiple levels, and listen to the adolescents’ voice towards the issue.
The conference was recorded and available here:
Associate Partners
The project involves as well as associate partners from all over Europe to help us disseminate our project.
ADOC – ASSOCIAZIONE PER LA DIFESA E L’ORIENTAMENTO DEI CONSUMATORI and ANDROTEAM will involve Italian schools to promote the project and the realization of the related activities; involvement of different medical professionals to provide reliable answers to the questions of the students; dissemination of the material through the channels of the association (social media, websites, newsletter …).
ASEPO (Associacíon Española para Personas Obesas y el Tratiametno de la Obesidad) will promote, disseminate, in different media, including web platforms, the entire project, and its content, with the aim of giving it visibility and being able to help all interested people who want to benefit from it.
BASORD will help us in translating in Bulgarian and disseminating the materials to their members.
Lastly, the project’s results and intellectual outputs will also be made accessible on the online platform “Erasmus+ Project results” and on the project’s collaborative online platform.
If you are a school that is interested in implementing the training in your premises, please contact us at the following email address : communications@safefoodadvocacy.eu.
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