Junior Wellness Programme launched at Fredrick Smith Secondary

Students of the Fredrick Smith Secondary School were treated to an informed wellness session hosted by their peers who were champions and ambassadors of the Junior Wellness Programme.

During the launch of the programme that took place at the Fredrick Smith Secondary School yesterday afternoon, Dionne Licorish, Marketing Manager at Sandy Crest and Coverley Medical Centre, told the media that the wellness champions were children because they realised that students were more open to listening to vital information if it came from a person that they are able to quickly relate to. Yesterday these students shared information on how to be healthy and how to tend to the wellness of your body.

“We’re hoping that by using this forum and using their own colleagues, that maybe they will open up to the idea of wellness so that when we officially bring the programme into the schools, they will be more open and willing to participate,” she said.

The Marketing Manager explained that they partnered with St. James Parish Committee as a part of their 50th Anniversary celebrations last year to form the Junior Wellness Programme and thought that it would be a good idea to extend it to the children of primary and secondary schools and give them the opportunity to learn about their health. She said that they decided not to focus on the usual age group that suffer from non-communicable diseases but to start at a younger age group as a preventative measure.

Licorish explained that the youth group of wellness ambassadors have undergone training in areas such as CPR, cooking healthy meals, making smoothies and getting a general idea of what it means to be healthy. She added that the children were not only given information on physical wellness, but the programme took into consideration the five or six other aspects of wellness which included emotional, spiritual and intellectual wellness.

She revealed that they would have visited other schools in St. James spreading the message and expressed that the students were excited and open about the whole ordeal. She divulged that the response they received from the students was extremely encouraging and noted that they had other plans in mind so that they remain active and invested in the health of the primary and secondary school students.