At Halloween, most young people’s thoughts turn to candy, not cauliflower. But the Teacher Education Department at Edward Waters College wants to change that.
On Thursday, the faculty offered its teachers-in-training healthy alternatives to the junk food they grew up eating.
It was a hard sell for Josetta Arnold who came up with the idea. Arnold trains future teachers at the historically black college on Jacksonville’s Westside.
“We developed Healthy Halloween to give our Edward Waters College students the opportunity to taste fresh food, to look at celebrating using fresh food and fruit and not candy and sugar.”
And if they start eating healthier, Arnold says, they’ll be much more likely to pass that behavior along to their own students down the road.
“So this is why we’re trying hard to encourage: eat it, try it, you’ll like it, it’s good for you. But it is an upward battle.”
Edward Waters College is in Health District 1, an area of widespread poverty where high stress, stroke, diabetes and obesity are fairly common. Arnold says if folks ate healthier, they would be healthier.
18 year old EWC elementary education major Darren Evans is on board with that.
“Me being a teacher and the kids seeing me eating cauliflower, they’re gonna say 'Oh, well, Mr. Evans eats it so why can’t I?'”
This was the second year for the Healthy Halloween campaign at EWC. Josetta Arnold says her goal is to expand the program next year to include the families who live around the school.
