Advocating For Health To Local Youth

Student-athletes from Pre-Health Terps created and implemented a health advocacy program for local youth at College Park Academy, teaching them health literacy and instilling confidence in their advocacy skills. 

The “Maryland Athletics’ Pre-Health Terps Health Literacy Session” was implemented through College Park Academy’s Wellness Wednesdays program through the CPA+ after-school program. Student-athletes from the student group visited the academy monthly in February, March, and April to encourage middle school students to take charge of their health and impact their community. 

“We covered e-health literacy in the first session, sharing the importance of receiving online health information only from trustworthy resources, and how to tell which resources are trustworthy,” track & field student-athlete Kristin Nichols said. “Then we focused on creating health campaigns – we shared a presentation about setting campaign goals, knowing your audience, and tracking campaign success.”

The students at College Park Academy decided to focus their campaign on sanitation. They used their creativity and skills to build something they were proud of, learning about proper health behaviors and advocacy. 

“The rest of our time has been dedicated to hands-on work researching their health topic, sanitization, and creating campaign materials,” Nichols said. “Hopefully, this has continued to improve health literacy and communication skills.”

Nichols, a graduate distance runner on Maryland’s track and field team, enjoyed working with younger students to teach them skills she believed to be important for everyone. 

“My favorite part about implementing this program was working with CPA students,” she said. “My goal was for this program to center around what students believe to be prevalent community health issues, and which mediums students prefer to share information.”

The program was started by Nichols, who applied for and received a $750 mini-grant from the Do Good Institute to cover the initiative's material costs. She’s currently working with the Do Good Institute as an Accelerator Fellow, which is helping to develop her program. 

“I plan to spend my career researching ways to improve health behaviors through community initiatives and messaging strategies,” Nichols said. 

However, it was her own experience growing up that inspired her to pursue a path in health. 

“Growing up with Crohn’s disease, celiac disease, a hormone disorder and at one point 29 food allergies, I saw firsthand the impact that my mom’s health advocacy had on my treatment and recovery,” Nichols said. “Without my mom’s monitoring of symptoms, ability to utilize health information resources and ability to share thoughts and findings with doctors, I would never have had the opportunity to work towards my dream of competing for UMD’s cross country and track teams.”

She aimed to create an initiative to help younger students build the skills and confidence to converse with their healthcare providers about the best treatment options. While Nichols had her mom by her side to fight for her, she realized that not everyone is as fortunate. 

“I feel incredibly lucky to have had a strong health advocate growing up, but having the health advocacy skills that are too often necessary for wellness shouldn’t be a matter of luck,” Nichols said. 

Nichols wanted those within the program to be student-athletes working toward health careers. Luckily, many of her teammates, including the president of Pre-Health Terps, Emma Pegg, as well as Hannah Mack and Katie Altieri, were eager to partner with her in implementing this impactful program.

Nichols hoped that the initiative would benefit the mentors in addition to the students and that everyone could learn something that could help them in the future. 

“My hope was that not only would participants gain health literacy and advocacy skills, but mentors would gain a better understanding of how to communicate health ideas with younger populations,” she said.

Danielle Dyer, Community Engagement Intern for Maryland Athletics, described her experience working with Nichols and other athletes on the program. She credited everyone for their persistence and determination. 

“It was a genuine pleasure to support the Pre-Health Terps students in bringing their program idea to life,” Dyer said. “They took full ownership of the project, creating a meaningful and engaging initiative that fostered authentic connections with the students at College Park Academy.” 

Health advocacy is essential, especially for those facing health challenges. Nichols is proud of what she’s accomplished, and she understands the necessity of building literacy in today’s youth to stand up for themselves and their well-being.

“It’s important for youth to develop health advocacy skills because everyone will need to advocate for their health at some point,” Nichols said. “Having the health literacy and confidence necessary to communicate ideas to healthcare providers can help people reach treatment plans best suited to their goals, perhaps on a shorter timeline.”