An overview of the national nutrition education and training program evaluation

Abstract

This paper presents an organizing framework for nutrition education evaluation and summarizes a comprehensive study of the Nutrition Education and Training (NET) Program. After only two years of operation, the NET Program appears to have made a good start—programs are operating in nearly all states, NET funds are being distributed as intended, and diverse state-level NET programs are addressing the goals intended by the enabling legislation and the specific state problems discovered through needs assessments. Evaluations of NET programs revealed that both centralized (single curriculum) as well as decentralized (multiple curricula) state nutrition education programs have large positive effects on children's nutrition-related knowledge. We also found some positive effects on willingness to select and taste new foods, on reported food preferences, and on food-related attitudes. However, these behavioral and attitudinal effects were neither as strong nor as consistent across grades and programs as were the effects on knowledge.