Filtering by
Programs such as the Healthy Corner Store Initiative have been widely adopted in recent years to increase the availability of healthy foods in small retail food stores. Valid and reliable measures are necessary to evaluate the effectiveness of these programs. The validated instruments currently available for assessments require in-person evaluations, with surveys taking up to 30 minutes per store to complete. This instrument was developed by researchers at Arizona State University to simplify the process of evaluating the effectiveness of healthy store interventions, and to enable community partners and practitioners to conduct their own evaluations of food access. The SCAT was validated against an adapted version of the Nutrition Environment Measures Survey for Corner Stores, and tested for feasibility of use over the telephone. The SCAT was found to discriminate between corner stores in the top 20% of healthfulness scores from those in the lower 80% with 89% accuracy.
In 2015 a panel of experts was convened by Healthy Eating Research, a program of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, to establish a set of minimum guidelines small retail food stores could reach to be classified as meeting basic or preferred stocking levels. Work is currently in progress to assess how the SCAT scores correlate with basic and preferred levels.
• How do lesbian and gay music educators describe their sexual identity and professional identity?
• How do gay and lesbian music educators negotiate the tensions between these identities?
• What internal and external factors influence these negotiations?
• What are the similarities and differences among the participants of different generations?
Two large emerged from the analysis that provided a better understanding of the participants’ lives: finding sexual identity and finding professional identity. Within those themes, smaller sub-themes helped to better understand how the participants came to understand their sexuality and professional identity. External factors such as social and family support, religion, and cultural and generational movements influenced the ways in which the participants came to understand their sexual identity. Participants desired to be seen first as a competent music teacher, but also understood that they could have an impact on a student as a gay or lesbian role model or mentor. Sexual identity and professional identity did not function as separate constructs; rather they were interwoven throughout these lesbian and gay music educator’s self-identities.
In order to connect the reader with the participants, I engaged in a creative non-fiction writing process to (re)tell participant’s stories. Each story is unique and crafted in a way that the participant’s voice is privileged over my own. The stories come from the conversations and journal entries that the participants shared with me. The purpose of the stories is to provide the reader with a contextual understanding of each participant’s life, and to offer some considerations for ways in which we can engage with and support our lesbian and gay music educator colleagues.
This paper does not end with a tidy conclusion, but rather more questions and provocations that will continue the conversations. I hope this document will encourage thoughtful and critical conversations in the music education profession to help us move us forward to a place that is more empathetic, socially-just, and equitable.