North Carolina State University Becomes First Institution to Complete Partnership for a Healthier America’s Healthier Campus Commitment
The university met its goals to make healthier choices easier for its students, faculty and staff
WASHINGTON, DC – Today, the Partnership for a Healthier America (PHA), which works with the private sector and PHA Honorary Chair First Lady Michelle Obama to make healthier choices easier, announced that North Carolina State University, one of its first Healthier Campus Initiative partners, completed its commitment to expand healthier options across its campus.
NC State University is one of 38 colleges and universities that have signed onto a three-year commitment to adopt guidelines around nutrition, physical activity and programming. Implementing all 23 guidelines two years ahead of schedule, NC State University is the first campus to successfully complete its commitment, encouraging healthier options among the more than 40,000 students, faculty and staff on campus each year.
“Just a year ago, PHA launched its Healthier Campus Initiative in an effort to create healthier food and physical activity environments on campuses across the nation,” said PHA CEO Lawrence A. Soler. “The fact that NC State has already met all elements of its commitment is a testament to their leadership in the effort to make healthier choices easier on college and university campuses, and we couldn’t be prouder to have them on board as a PHA partner.”
“Our commitment to providing a healthier campus and the strengths of our campus wide partnerships are reflected in this significant achievement,” NC State Chancellor Randy Woodson said. “We’re proud to be part of this critical effort and hope our leadership spurs others to provide healthier options in their communities.”
Through its commitment to PHA, NC State University has built upon existing efforts, creating a healthier environment for its entire community. Of the 23 commitment elements implemented, a few highlights include:
- Offering a Dietitian’s Dish wellness meal daily at breakfast, lunch and dinner.
- Designating healthier food and beverage options in vending machines, c-stores and dining facilities using the Wolf-Approved healthy icon program.
- Ensuring that free water is available at all dining, recreational and educational facilities.
- Providing more than 150 group fitness classes each week in addition to more than 25 intramural activities each year.
- Opening a Functional Training area on campus, featuring more than 4,000 square feet of functional fitness space, complete with a cargo net, dip bars, sit-up benches, wall ball targets and box jumps.
- Combatting food insecurity on campus and throughout the community through the Feed the Pack Pantry.
A full overview of the commitment is available on PHA’s website.
As with all of PHA’s partners, each of the commitment elements have been verified by a third party and will be publicly reported in PHA’s annual progress report.
About PHA
The Partnership for a Healthier America (PHA) is devoted to working with the private sector to ensure the health of our nation’s youth by solving the childhood obesity crisis. In 2010, PHA was created in conjunction with – but independent from – First Lady Michelle Obama’s Let’s Move! effort. PHA is a nonpartisan nonprofit organization that is led by some of the nation’s most respected health and childhood obesity experts. PHA brings together public, private and nonprofit leaders to broker meaningful commitments and develop strategies to end childhood obesity. Most important, PHA ensures that commitments made are commitments kept by working with unbiased, third parties to monitor and publicly report on the progress our partners are making. For more information about PHA, please visit www.aHealthierAmerica.org and follow PHA on Twitter @PHAnews.