The Graduate Training Fellowships in Childhood Obesity Prevention Program targets issues such as the number of obese children in the U.S. tripling in last 30 years.
Beginning in Fall Semester, 2011, seven doctoral students will become part of Penn State’s new Childhood Obesity Prevention Training (COPT) Program. Dr. Leann Birch, Distinguished Professor of Human Development and Director of the Center for Childhood Obesity Research and Dr. Gordon Jensen, Professor of Nutritional Science and Head of the Department of Nutritional Sciences, designed the program in response to the sky-rocketing rates of childhood obesity in the United States. Over the last three decades the number of obese children tripled, and obesity-related health problems are currently estimated to account for up to 17% of all medical spending, around $168 billion. Birch and Gordon received $4.5 million for the 5-year training program from the USDA’s National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA). The training program will support an average of 11 graduate students per year as the program grows.
COPT program fellows will receive full tuition and stipends and can elect to earn their degree in either Human Development and Family Studies (HDFS) or Nutritional Sciences. Coursework covers four areas including: (1) Nutritional Sciences, (2) Child Development and Family Studies, (3) Prevention and Intervention Research, and (4) Research Methodology and Statistics. In addition to a topically relevant dissertation project, fellows will also complete an applied internship in: Commerce & Industry, Education and Outreach, Medicine, or Public Policy. The overarching goal of the program is to train a new generation of behavioral nutrition scientists whose work can help to break the cycle of childhood obesity.
Integral to the USDA’s decision to award the grant to Birch and Jensen was the preeminence of Penn State’s faculty researchers in the areas of nutrition, child development and family studies, prevention science, and methodology. In addition to Dr. Birch and Dr. Jensen, faculty who will be involved in the leadership of COPT include: Dr. Linda Collins, Director, The Methodology Center and Professor of Human Development; Dr. Mark Greenberg, Director, Prevention Research Center and Edna Bennett Professor of Human Development; Dr. Susan McHale, Director, The Social Science Research Institute and Professor of Human Development and Dr. Barbara Rolls, Director, Human Laboratory for the Study of Human Ingestive Behavior and Professor of Nutrition. The multi-disciplinary nature of this team embodies Penn State’s mission to integrate social, behavioral, and nutritional approaches to training the next generation of researchers whose work is aimed at preventing childhood obesity.