SFU and Central elementary celebrate healthy bond
Kitty Corbett, 778.782.7190, 778.999.2705 (cell); kcorbett@sfu.ca
Nadine Tambellini, 604.941.0355; ntambellini@sd43.bc.ca
Blake Stitilis, 604.928.3244; bsa24@sfu.ca
Other SFU students available:
Kari Lyster, 604.614.7739; klyster@sfu.ca
Piper Chalke, 604.836.4099; prc4@sfu.ca
Carol Thorbes, PAMR, 778.782.3035; cthorbes@sfu.ca
Note: clearance already obtained for photos/video of children
Blogging and bonding with little kids were a big part of Simon Fraser University student Blake Stitilis’ life this semester.
Stitilis is one of 18 SFU undergrads pursuing a BA in health sciences who will do a free public show-and-tell about their learning in a novel course that took them back to elementary school.
On Fri., Dec. 3, (3-5 p.m.) at Central Community Elementary School in Port Coquitlam, the students will present posters about their blend of academic and real world learning in Community and Health Service.
The three-hour, once a week course — the first of its kind at SFU — was held alternately at SFU’s Blusson Hall on Burnaby Mountain and at Central’s library.
In addition to attending lectures about community health promotion, the SFU students put in a minimum four hours weekly of volunteered service work that applied their academic learning at the elementary school. They also had to provide their classmates with reflections about their development of projects that applied their academic learning in a community setting.
SFU health sciences professor Kitty Corbett and Central school principal Nadine Tambellini —the brainchilds of the course — say it was such as success for all involved that it is being offered again in January 2011.
“The experience has opened doors for students and teachers at the school, and also for our students. Sustaining our partnership is important to all of us,” says Corbett.
“Some students came in with experience with kids already, and a few had none. But it didn’t take long before they were all very comfortable and so gratified by the noisy, warm welcome they would each receive when they arrived at school.”
As his in-service project, Stitilis engaged parents and educators in a dialogue about health promotion through a blog. The fourth year student says doing the project in a real life setting taught him a lot about the overwhelming amount of work involved in community health promotion and the need to address your audience at their level of education.
He adds: “For my poster, I’m planning on creating a how-to theme, designing the poster like a blown up version of the blog with arrows pointing to regions of the page and explaining what they are and what one can do to participate…In this way, I hope to build capacity within the community to engage in open discussion of ideas about making the community more conducive to health.”
Tambellini notes that the students spent far more time on their volunteered service work than required. She adds: “Our kids love the university students and, because of their connections with their SFU friends, many of our kids have experienced successes in their school lives and healthy habits that could have taken longer to achieve.”
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