Health, Safety, and Wellness Educator Update

Michelle T., SNAP-Ed Nutrition Educator

Starting October 1st, I began working as the Health, Safety and Wellness Educator at Douglas County Extension. Coming off almost one year of providing SNAP Education, the transition was smooth. The challenge is creating classes that the community wants and can benefit from. We are embracing a fee for service model, and able to provide a more diverse class lineup.

Collage of Michelle Thacker teaching classes and her students participating in lessons.

Classes taught so far have been Comfort Food at the Merc Co+op, where participants learned about adjusting comfort foods to reduce sodium, sugar and fat. Cooking for 1 or 2 focused on ways to scale down recipes, freezing tips and searching out methods to create nutritious meals at home. A big thrill was getting to provide a healthy eating experience and cooking class to clients at Cottonwood Inc.! Participants created chicken stir fry and a dessert with berries and banana cream.

Many more classes are in the works to round out the end of this year and start the next. We will be partnering with the Merc Co+op for future classes and will be offering ServSafe food handler courses for those that work in the food and beverage industry as well as healthcare settings. Be on the lookout for our classes we will be partnering with Lawrence Parks and Recreation with for January and February. We will have a series of cooking classes geared towards seniors. We have not left the students out-we will be offering an early release cooking class for kids in December as well as a cooking workshop in January for students ages 7-12.

We are always looking for new audiences and opportunities to teach in the community. Reach out to us to see how we can provide the opportunity for you or your organization to participate.

This article is from the 2025 K-State Extension Douglas County Winter Newsletter publication.