SWAG��Ƶ

Kira Rodriguez, M.H.S., and Pamela Bruno, M.P.H., senior research associates in the Center for Excellence in Public Health at the SWAG��Ƶ, have co-authored a multistate study on the impact of COVID-19 on the implementation of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program – Education (SNAP-Ed) program. 

The article, titled “Impacts, Adaptations, and Preparedness Among SNAP-Ed Implementers During the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Multistate Study,” published in the Journal of Public Health Management & Practice, examines the pandemic’s impact on program implementation across five states: South Carolina, Rhode Island, Kansas, Oklahoma, and Maine. The authors surveyed and interviewed 181 SNAP-Ed nutrition educators, supervisors, and administrators to study the facilitators and barriers for adapting programming, uplifting the factors that would have helped with preparedness.

The authors of the multi-methods study are SNAP-Ed program evaluators in a national community of practice who convened to address gaps in understanding in how a prolonged, national emergency affects public health program implementation. Shared instrument design informed quantitative and qualitative data collection on the degree of pandemic impact on curriculum delivery; policy, systems, and environmental changes; external multisector partner relationships; and internal staff engagement. 

Positive and negative impacts surfaced in the data analysis, with direct delivery of nutrition education — typically delivered in person — commonly reported as most significantly impacted by COVID-19 restrictions. Pivoting to virtual delivery of programming was both helped and hindered by technology, the researchers found, with unanticipated challenges providing barriers in terms of capacity and training. Study participants shared lessons learned and flexibilities needed for adaptations that have policy implications that could enhance future emergency preparedness for SNAP-Ed and similar direct service and community-oriented public health programming.