JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – A local school is making strides toward healthier lifestyles for its students thanks to a partnership with the Blue Zones Project Jacksonville.
Organizers and school leaders at Normandy Village Elementary School on the Westside say the community as a whole will benefit.
The school is the first approved by the Blue Zones Project Jacksonville, a local effort to help people live a healthier lifestyle.
“Being born and raised in Jacksonville and going to an elementary school similar to Normandy Village, it’s really exciting to see that we are pouring back into the future of our young people and making sure that they have access, as well as the opportunity to learn their own behaviors and take that back into their household,” said Nicole Hamm, executive director of Blue Zones Project Jacksonville.
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The organization said the partnership means students will learn healthier options surrounding food and fitness, which officials say will improve their mental health as well.
“There’s going to be an increase in fruits and vegetables, which is going to be super exciting as well as natural activity, beyond P.E. Dancing in the hallways, or jumping back and forth or even the encouragement to stand during the school day, which is super important for young people to understand their bodies and to be able to move through their feelings and emotions at such a young age,” Hamm said.
The Blue Zones Project focuses on five zip codes across the city -- 32206, 32208, 32209, 32210, 32244.
These are areas organizers identified as having a lack of access to fresh food, produce and grocery stores with healthy options.
“We’re in a part of a city where we have food deserts, where we don’t have healthy options as close as we want them to be,” said Rashid Williams, Blue Zones Project Jacksonville Schools Lead. “I live on the Westside myself and I drive down Normandy and it’s not a lot of great healthy options. We want to empower people within our own communities to live better longer.”
It’s one of the reasons Principal Jessica Sales is excited for her students to have this new opportunity. .
“You have to think about the whole child. When you’re thinking about achievement, you have to consider, what are their needs, what barriers come into play. Blue Zones was actually a perfect partnership,” Sales said.
The Blue Zones Project is actively working to expand the partnerships to other schools.
“This is an incredible step, especially at the district level,” Hamm said. “This gives us an opportunity to say we’ve seen these things in this school, what does that look like countywide for all students.”