September 20, 2000
Page A5
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i Health/Education
Vancouver Women Joins Diet Study
Decides to get serious about her health
Ella Anderson, a longtime Port
land resident who now lives in
Vancouver, recently decided to get
serious about taking care other health.
“My blood pressure had been
going up and down
for quite awhile,”
says Mrs. A nder
son.
“There’s history
o f high blood pres
sure in my family, so
I was starting to get
concerned. Then 1
got a postcard from
Kaiser Permanente’s
Center for Health Re
search in Portland in
viting me tojoin their
research
study
about
reducing
blood pressu re.
Ella Anderson
When 1 saw the study
involved changing my diet and exer
cising more, and didn’t involve tak
ing drags, I just knew I had to give it
a serious try.”
Like hundreds of other people
across the United States, Mrs. Ander
son volunteered to participate in PRE
MIER, a new research program study
ing the effects o f a healthy diet and
exercise on blood pressure.
High blood pressure (also known
as hypertension) affects nearly one
in four Americans. While high blood
pressure can occur in anyone at any
age, it is particularly common in older
people and African Americans.
People with high blood pressure have
a greater
riskofheart
a tta c k s ,
strokes and
kidney dis
ease.
Past re
search has
shown that
w e ig h t
loss, exer
cise and a
healthy diet
can each
re d u c e
blood pres
sure and
help control
hypertension. PREMIER is the first
research program to study the com
bined effect o f these three ways to
lower blood pressure.
Taking blood pressure medication
is also an effective way to control
hypertension but can be costly, dif
ficult to use, and have negative side
effects.
"Uoined PREMIER formyselfand
for others, especially for other Afri
can Americans,” says Mrs. Ander
son. I want to feel better, and I want
my quality o f life to be better. I want
to be here for my family and my
grandkids. As an African American,
I also think it’s very important tojoin
a study like this. High blood pressure
is a major problem in our community,
but I’m not sure we take it seriously
enough. We need to be more con
scious o f what we eat, especially fat
and sodium, and we need to get more
exercise.”
People whojoin PREMIER are in
volved in the study for 18 months. “1
don’t think about the 18 months,”
Mrs. Anderson says. “I take it one
day at a time and, after three months,
eating healthier foods and getting
more exercise are becoming my new
way of life.
Eating the foods they recommend
was pretty easy for me because I love
vegetables, but exercising more was
harder. Now it’s fun and exciting. I
see differences in my energy, my
weight and my shape."
Mrs. Anderson attends group and
individual classes at the Center for
Health
Research, which is located at 3800
North Interstate Avenue Portland. “I
felt very com fortable going to
classes,” says Mrs. Anderson. “The
PREMIER staff and the other people
in the study are very supportive."
Freedom
Summer
2000
A s this summer winds to a close, I
wanted to take another opportunity
to write about one o f the Children’s
Defense Fund (CDF) and Black Com-
m u n ity C ru sad e for C hildren
(BCCC)’s signature programs: our
Summer and After-School Freedom
Schools.
At the beginning o f the sea
son, I shared w hat our Freedom
School children were reading this
summer.
This time I want to tell you about
the Freedom School day and what
students learn from the Freedom
School experience.
Freedom schools were first estab
lished in Mississippi as part o f the
voter registration and community
mobilization efforts during the leg
endary Freedom Summer o f 1964.
In 1993 the C hild ren ’s D efense
Fund and the B lack Com m unity
Crusade for C hildren began coor
dinating a new Freedom School
m ovem ent as a means o fb rin g in g
p a re n ts , c o lle g e - a g e d y o u n g
ad u lt, and com m unity leaders
to g e th e r to serv e and m en to r
children, strengthen p arent and
c o m m u n ity in v o lv e m e n t in
children’s education and achieve
m ent, and train a su ccessor gen
eration o f young leaders.
Religious, local school groups, and
other community-based organiza
tions sponsor Freedom Schools in
their communities, coordinating the
fund-raising and overall management.
Each site is ran by a project director
and site coordinator.
Children are taught by college-
aged servant-leaders and mentors
who are trained at Haley Farm, CD’s
center for intergenerational spiritual
renewal, leadership development,
and community capacity building.
Identifying and training these ser
vant-leaders is a key part of the free
dom School experience and al lows us
to develop a new generation o f young
people committed to serving children.
Parents are required to attend
parenting workshops in order for their
children to participate.
Many parents leave the workshops
feeling as if they have learned just as
much as their children from the Free
dom School experience.
The Summer Freedom School day
begins with breakfast. The nutritious
meals and snacks students and staff
share together are an important part
o f the program and are subsidized by
the Department of Agriculture's Sum
mer Food Service Program.
Tips for
Parents:
Help Kids
Use Brains to
Battle Bullies
Sooner or later, your child may en
counter a bully. How will your child
handle that encounter? How might
you help?
There was a time when it was
thought that bullies didn't intend to
be malicious— underneath was a
lovable sweetheart suffering from
low self-esteem. Researchers are
rethinking that point of view, says
Maggie Greene, a safe-schools
trainer with the National Resource
Center for Safe Schools at the
Northwest Regional Educational
Laboratory.
“Bullies seem to have pretty
strong self-esteem,” Maggie reports.
"Their behavior is learned, it’s
learned early, and it needs to be
remedied early, before the age of
eight, in order to prevent chronic bul
lying behavior."
Bullying, she explains, is when
one child or a group intentionally
hurts another child over and over
again, and over a prolonged period.
It’s beyond good-natured occasional
joking or teasing. Hurt is inflicted
Real-world
instructors
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Easy transfer
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through assaults tnat can range trom
words, such as name calling or taunt
ing, to physical aggression— kick
ing, shoving, fighting. And a subtler,
but just as damaging form, says
Maggie, is shunning or socially iso
lating a child.
Maggie suggests that parental an
tennae be attuned to signs that could
suggest that their child might be hav
ing trouble with a bully. Here are just
some of the signs to watch for. If
your child:
• Comes home from school with cuts
and braises, damaged school materi
als, and/or clothes dirty and/or torn
• Frequently loses possessions
• Appears afraid, or depressed, or
moody
• Often cries before going to sleep
• Feels ill in the morning to avoid
Celebrate the “Soul o f the City!
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going to school
• Loses interest in school work
• Becomes quiet, passive, or anxious
Kids often hesitate to reveal they
are being bullied. If you suspect
something is amiss, take the direct
approach and ask if there’s a prob
lem. Although kids typically will
deny it initially, encourage him or
her to share their feelings by assuring
that you’ll help and support them in
solving any problems.
Maggie advises, however, not to
promise that you won’t tell. Instead,
reiterate and reassure of your support
and assistance in helping the child to
work out the problem. The best strat
egy, says Maggie, is to teach your
kids ways of avoiding encounters
with a bully. Some parents worry that
they’re teaching their kids to be cow
ards, and that socking the bully will
solve the problem once and for all. On
the contrary, contends Maggie. Re
turning aggression with aggression
escalates and inflames a situation.
Instead, help develop strategies to
solve the problem. Here are a few:
• Avoid the bully. Don’t be alone
where the bully can pick on you.
• Enlist a friend to help. Bullies have
a harder time picking on one person
if someone else is around.
• Try not to show a reaction; bullies
like reactions.
If you think these add up
to a great education,
you’ve already
The Urban League of Portland
Dinner, Wednesday evening
October 4, 2000
wants you to save this
You will receive an invitation after Labor Day,
but please mark your calendar now for this
special occasion!
For more information, call the Urban League at
(503)280-2600.
passed your first test.
Classes start the week of Sept. 25.
Call 503-614-7270.
www.pcc.edu
Portland
Community
College
College That fits Tour Life
SAFEWAY
FO O D & DRUG
Tickets: $ 175 each/ S 1,750 for a table of 10,
$5,000 for Dinner Sponsorship.
Proceeds benefit The Urban League of Portland
and its program.
The Urban League o f Portland. ION. Russell street. Portland, Oregon 97227
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