WFP champions school health and nutrition through a nutrition educational package developed in coordination with MEHE for KG1-Grade 9, which teaches children about the importance of good nutrition and how to make healthy choices. The nutrition package focuses on five topics - food sources, the importance of healthy eating, food groups, healthy food choices and healthy breakfast - and is adapted to the different nutrition needs of the targeted age groups such as the specific needs of adolescent girls. The nutrition package was designed based on the discovery learning concept. The main principle behind this concept is learning through exploration - students become more likely to retain the information they discovered on their own.
During this school year, WFP worked closely, and UNICEF started collaborating in supporting MEHE in the development and roll-out of an integrated Social and Behavioral Change package on promoting nutrition and child development outcomes for all school-aged children, and eventually to be integrated as part of the formal curriculum, whereby WFP leads the Nutrition Education pillar targeting the primary and secondary school-aged children.
WFP plans in the school year 2024-2025 to build the capacity of 50 school health educators through a set of workshops on delivering this nutrition package through gender-sensitive nutrition awareness sessions to the students enrolled in WFP-supported schools. A total of five gender-sensitive nutrition awareness sessions should be delivered to students per grade throughout the academic year 2024-2025.