Students receive benefits at Wellness Fair

By Gisselle Washington |Staff Writer |

Students had the opportunity to learn important health and wellness information from 40 community groups and health organizations at the Health and Wellness Fair in the Community Garden on Wednesday, April 17, 2019.

“A lot of new vendors came, like a program to build your own bike, we had the Texas A&M community operative folks come out and talking about building your own garden in your own home, and we had folks from SAWS, San Antonio Food Bank talk about healthy eating,” event coordinator Francisco Martinez said. “So at the end of the day [the goal was] to connect the community to resources and provide them anything new they can learn from the Health and Wellness Fair either from themselves or their parents.”

This was the third annual Health and Wellness Fair held at Roosevelt, originally started to celebrate the opening of the Community Garden and bring in outside resources for the community to learn about gardening and healthy living.

“I believe it is very needed,” AVID teacher Brock Stewart said. “The students have the opportunity to explore healthy alternatives, creating awareness and improving the quality of life through these ‘a ha’ moments these students had through conversations and activities.”

The planning for the event started right after the winter holiday break.

“We invited the same vendors that came to us last year and opened up to new ones,” Martinez said.

Approximately 200 people attended the event, including students finishing practice after school and parents picking up their students.

“The fair was a very educational experience,” student Sandra Ortiz said. “I was able to learn about the importance of health in a fun way.”

The Wellness Fair plans to expand with more vendors to outreach to the community in the upcoming years.

“We can always use more people to take advantage of the information,” Martinez said. “Every year we’re trying to make it bigger with more vendors but more than anything with more community. We always invite our cluster schools, the eight elementaries and two middle schools plus Roosevelt. The more people we have the better.”