Enhancing safe routes to school programs through community-engaged citizen science: two pilot investigations in lower density areas of Santa Clara County, California, USA.

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  • Additional Information
    • Source:
      Publisher: BioMed Central Country of Publication: England NLM ID: 100968562 Publication Model: Electronic Cited Medium: Internet ISSN: 1471-2458 (Electronic) Linking ISSN: 14712458 NLM ISO Abbreviation: BMC Public Health Subsets: MEDLINE
    • Publication Information:
      Original Publication: London : BioMed Central, [2001-
    • Subject Terms:
      Safety* ; Schools*; Transportation/*methods; Adult ; Bicycling ; California ; Child ; Community Participation ; Female ; Humans ; Male ; Parents ; Pilot Projects ; Program Evaluation ; Prospective Studies ; Students ; Technology/methods ; Walking
    • Abstract:
      Background: While promoting active commuting to school can positively affect children's daily physical activity levels, effectively engaging community members to maximize program impact remains challenging. We evaluated the initial utility of adding a technology-enabled citizen science engagement model, called Our Voice, to a standard Safe Routes to School (SRTS) program to enhance program engagement activities and student travel mode behavior.
      Methods: In Investigation 1, a prospective controlled comparison design was used to compare the initial year of the Santa Clara County Public Health Department's SRTS program, with and without the Our Voice engagement model added, in two elementary schools in Gilroy, California, USA. School parents served as Our Voice citizen scientists in the SRTS + Our Voice school. In Investigation 2, the feasibility of the combined SRTS + Our Voice methods was evaluated in a middle school in the same district using students, rather than adults, as citizen scientists. Standard SRTS program engagement measures and student travel mode tallies were collected at the beginning and end of the school year for each school.
      Results: In the elementary school investigation (Investigation 1), the SRTS + Our Voice elementary school held twice as many first-year SRTS planning/encouragement events compared to the SRTS-Alone elementary school, and between-school changes in walking/biking to school rates favored the SRTS + Our Voice school (increases of 24.5% vs. 2.6%, P < .001). The Investigation 2 results supported the feasibility of using students to conduct SRTS + Our Voice in a middle school-age population.
      Conclusions: The findings from this first-generation study indicated that adding a technology-enabled citizen science process to a standard elementary school SRTS program was associated with higher levels of community engagement and walking/biking to school compared to SRTS alone. The approach was also found to be acceptable and feasible in a middle school setting.
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    • Grant Information:
      R01 DK102016 United States DK NIDDK NIH HHS; T32 HL007034 National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute; 5R01DK102016 National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases; T32 HL007034 United States HL NHLBI NIH HHS; U54 MD010724 United States MD NIMHD NIH HHS; R01 CA211048 United States CA NCI NIH HHS; 7334 Robert Wood Johnson Foundation; 5R01CA211048 National Cancer Institute; P20 CA217199 United States CA NCI NIH HHS; U54 EB020405 United States EB NIBIB NIH HHS
    • Contributed Indexing:
      Keywords: Active transport; Bicycling; Built environment; Children; Citizen science; Community engagement; Safe routes to school; School health; Transportation; Walking
    • Publication Date:
      Date Created: 20190303 Date Completed: 20190410 Latest Revision: 20200225
    • Publication Date:
      20240105
    • Accession Number:
      PMC6397479
    • Accession Number:
      10.1186/s12889-019-6563-1
    • Accession Number:
      30823917