The nonprofit Fisher House Foundation, which provides a home away from home near military medical centers for families experiencing a medical crisis, is a key partner in the Scholarships for Military Children Program, underwriting its administration. In the program’s 16 years, more than 9,400 students, all of them sons or daughters of commissary patrons and selected from a pool of 85,000 applicants, have shared more than $15.3 million in scholarship grants.
In every year since the first scholarships were awarded for the 2001-2002 academic year, the number of recipients, and the total dollar amount of grants awarded, has increased or remained stable. For the 2016-2017 school year, a total of $1.4 million was awarded: 700 students received $2,000 each to pursue their studies.
The Scholarships for Military Children Program is open to sons and daughters of active-duty, Reserve/Guard, or retired military commissary customers. Recipients must be enrolled, or planning to enroll, full time in a four-year undergraduate college or university or a two-year community college accredited in the United States. They must have a minimum cumulative grade point average of 3.0. At least one scholarship recipient is selected at each commissary location where qualified applications are received, and additional recipients are selected, pro rata, based on the number of applicants at individual commissaries. In every year since the first scholarships were awarded for the 2001-2002 academic year, the number of recipients, and the total dollar amount of grants awarded, has increased or remained stable. For the 2016-2017 school year, a total of $1.4 million was awarded: 700 students received $2,000 each to pursue their studies.
Three scholarship recipients from the Scholarships for Military Children Program. Scholarships are funded by donations from commissary vendors, manufacturers, brokers, suppliers, and the general public. Every dollar donated goes directly to funding scholarships. No taxpayer dollars are expended on the scholarship program. DeCA photo
Because they are where military families make most of their food purchasing decisions, the commissaries are in a unique position to help them address a health crisis that increasingly confronts the American population at large: A variety of factors, including a high-calorie diet and a lack of opportunities for physical activity, has dramatically increased the rate of obesity – and of related diseases, such as diabetes and heart disease – in the United States. According to the National Institutes of Health, the rate of obesity in adults aged 20 to 74 more than doubled from 1952 to 2006, from 13.4 percent to 35.1 percent. The average American adult is now 26 pounds heavier than in 1950.
The U.S. Surgeon General, alarmed at this rate of increase, launched the National Prevention Strategy in 2011, and the Department of Defense (DOD) quickly joined the nationwide effort to improve the overall health and well-being of families by launching its prevention-oriented complement to the strategy: Operation Live Well. At the time, DeCA had already been tuned in to the need to promote healthy choices at its stores; the agency had hired its first registered dietician, Army Reserve Maj. Karen Fauber, in 2007 to help with a DeCA/Tricare healthy choices initiative, providing nutrition education.
Early in 2012, the assistant secretary of defense for health affairs drafted a set of action items that required commitment across all branches and among all DOD agencies and outside groups involved in the procurement of food for service members and their families, including DeCA, the military exchanges, the Defense Logistics Agency, and the Morale Working Group (MWG). Because many of the 400 U.S. military bases resembled self-contained towns or communities, with their own stores, restaurants, and parks, DOD focused its efforts at this level. In 2013, the military launched its Healthy Base Initiative (HBI).
The HBI began as a pilot program, aimed at select military installations’ efforts to support improved nutritional choices, increased physical activity, obesity reduction, and decreased tobacco use. Commissaries at four locations – Fort Meade, Maryland; Fort Bragg, North Carolina; Marine Corps Base Quantico, Virginia; and March Air Force Base, California – led DeCA’s effort to support the HBI, providing customers with food, product choices, and information to make their lives healthier.
While the offerings at DeCA commissaries are driven solely by consumer preference, the agency works in concert with several DOD programs – including the HBI, the Army’s Performance Triad, and Total Force Fitness, to name just a few – to help consumers make the best possible choices for themselves and their families.
The “Better For You” criteria developed for DOD by the nonprofit Hudson Institute identifies foods that are healthier both in caloric and nutritional content, and these standards have been incorporated into the HBI. Nearly half of all commissary products meet these criteria, and DeCA launched an effort to help consumers learn about the benefits of Better For You foods, and about how to identify these foods in stores. In cooperation with on-base health and well-being services, the commissaries launched consumer information and education campaigns that included signs and special product displays highlighting Better For You foods, cooking demonstrations, and store tours conducted by installation dietitians, and easily accessible Internet resources. DeCA continues to use its website (www.commissaries.com), social media platforms, and store signage – shelf talkers, fliers, and rack cards – to pass on nutrition information to patrons. On the website, under the tab “Healthy Living,” patrons can find articles, cooking tips, recipes, and more related to health and nutrition from a variety of DOD nutrition resources.