Teaching Tools Foster Science and Diabetes Education in Native American Schools
Diabetes is increasingly found in children and youth, especially among Native Americans. A new K-12 curriculum aims to prevent or delay the disease and inspire students to pursue health and science careers.
Akinso: Schools across the country now have free access to a set of teaching tools designed to increase the understanding of science, health, and diabetes among Native American students. Dr. Lawrence Agodoa is the Director of the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases' Office of Minority Health Research Coordination.
Agodoa: The specific name for the tool is called "Health is Life in Balance." Several years ago the Tribal Leaders Diabetes Committee, which represents all the regions for the American Indian Alaskan natives, met with NIDDK and asked if we could help do something about the epidemic of diabetes in their communities especially in children. We got together with them and brainstormed and decided that we would come up with a program that addresses diabetes and this program should be for all children who are in school K-12.
Akinso: The curriculum, a product of the Diabetes-based Science Education in Tribal Schools program, was developed in collaboration with eight tribal colleges and universities and several Native American organizations. Dr. Agodoa says this curriculum is an important step in educating American Indian and Alaska Native youth about preventing diabetes.
Agodoa: We decided to develop science curricula, but using diabetes as the tool for science. And with the two purposes-one is to educate these kids, K-12, about diabetes how to prevent it and how to take of it particularly in their families. And the second goal is to interest them in picking up careers in the health sciences.
Akinso: The rate of diagnosed diabetes in American Indians and Alaska Natives is two to three times that of non-Hispanic whites. The project was funded by the National Institutes of Health, the Indian Health Service, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. To order free printed copies or CDs of the curriculum, visit, www.ihs.gov. This is Wally Akinso at the National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, Maryland.
About This Audio Report
Reporter: Wally Akinso
Sound Bite: Dr. Lawrence Agodoa
Topic: Diabetes, Native Americans