Teaching healthy habits at Conetoe Family Life Center Summer Camp

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Mariava Phillips
July 22, 2024

Some of the School’s volunteers gather for a photo while serving at Conetoe Family Life Center Summer Camp. Photo credit: Betsy Sleath.

A highlight each summer is when faculty, staff, students and alumni from the UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy volunteer at the Conetoe Family Life Center Summer Camp. The camp was created for local children and teens to teach them about chronic disease states, medication management, nutrition and how to build conscious awareness about their health and their family’s health.

“I volunteered for Conetoe this year because I was lucky enough to go to the camp last year, and I was so moved by how much the campers appreciated us being there,” said Jenny Koerner, Pharm.D. candidate Class of 2026. “Conetoe is a very rural area, and the kids don’t have access to much, so any little thing we had prepared for them really made a difference in their lives.”

Students taught from a curriculum they designed on different topics such as heart health, mental health and healthy eating. To help make it fun and engaging for campers, they incorporated activities like learning how to do CPR on mannequins to the song “Staying Alive”, how to read over-the-counter medicine labels, how to make hand sanitizer and they even had a surprise visit from a medicine pill mascot.

Ty Chapman dressed up as a pill mascot for the kids. Photo credit: Jenny Koerner.

“A highlight for me was dressing up in [the] giant fuzzy pill costume, getting hugs from the kids at camp and being given the nickname Tylenol,” said Ty Chapman, Pharm.D. candidate Class of 2025.

Another unique aspect of this year’s camp was giving the campers the opportunity to hear oral histories of health care practitioners from Eastern North Carolina and why they became doctors, nurses or pharmacists. The youth at camp then taped their own oral history.

“I hope the kids gained the awareness that Conetoe, and areas around Conetoe, have so much rich history and culture and that they have the ability to grow and change with the community in a positive way, like those before them have done and continue to do,” said Chapman.

“If the kids walk away with a better understanding of how to make healthy choices in all aspects of their lives, I think we’ve done our job,” said Koerner.

“This camp makes me realize how much potential we have as a profession to help the children of North Carolina,” said Betsy Sleath, Ph.D., Regional Associate Dean for Eastern North Carolina and George H. Cocolas Distinguished Professor in the Division of Pharmaceutical Outcomes and Policy. “Many live in difficult situations and sometimes just one smile, hug, or kind word of encouragement can make their day better. I am glad our school is working to encourage youth of all backgrounds to come train with us so they can go back to serve their communities.”

Looking ahead to next summer, the desire is to open this opportunity to other schools at UNC-Chapel Hill to offer an interprofessional experience.

“I observed so many tremendous opportunities for intentionally designed interprofessional experiential learning at the Conetoe Family Life Center Summer Camp,” said Nicki Pinelli Reitter, Pharm.D., executive director for Interprofessional Collaborative Practice, and an associate professor in the Division of Practice Advancement and Clinical Education at the School. “We are so fortunate to have strong partnerships and support from the Office of Interprofessional Education and Practice within the Provost’s Office and North Carolina Area Health Education Centers as we work to envision interprofessional experiences next summer.”