As part of ICH’s ongoing technical assistance, collaboration and evaluation efforts with the Shape up Somerville initiative (SUS), with the support of the City of Somerville and a Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Healthy Kids and Healthy Communities (HKHC) grant, ICH is working closely with the SUS director to develop a 10 year Shape Up Somerville retrospective report (2002-2011) of the major activities and accomplishments of this community based obesity prevention initiative. The 10 year retrospective report builds on a longstanding partnership with SUS and expands on a current SUS HKHC project where ICH is co-developing a body mass index (BMI) snapshot report, detailing the progress of SUS initiatives over the years with respect to BMI.
Specifically, this 10-year retrospective report will document the evolution of SUS over the 10 years focusing on:
- Stakeholder involvement
- Activities, initiatives and policies implemented across SUS phases
- Diverse ecological approaches employed
- Major outcomes over the course of the SUS project
- Sustainability and institutional efforts to date
Currently, the major partners involved in the generation of the content for the SUS retrospective report include: the Institute for Community Health, Somerville Public Health Department, Cambridge Health Alliance, Tufts University, and the Shape Up Somerville Task Force.
Additionally, ICH is providing general technical assistance and advising to the SUS Director on future initiatives, grants and policy/programmatic priorities.