Sesame Street Muppets to join experts on webinar that offers resources to keep families connected
MINNETONKA, Minn.–(BUSINESS WIRE)–UnitedHealthcare and Sesame Workshop, the nonprofit educational organization behind Sesame Street, are co-creating a webinar designed to keep grandparents and their grandchildren connected during COVID-19. The effort, part of an ongoing collaboration between UnitedHealthcare and Sesame Workshop, is launching on National Grandparents Day, Sunday, Sept. 13.
The Growing Every Day, Every Way virtual webinar will celebrate National Grandparents Day by bringing families together with their grandparents and providing ideas for healthy activities they can do in person, or apart. The webinar will provide families and grandparents with resources to help them access affordable and nutritious food, maximize their health benefits and offer easy ways families can incorporate physical activity into their daily lives. Families can watch the webinar featuring some of their favorite Sesame Street Muppets at www.grandparentsday.com.
Sesame Workshop and UnitedHealthcare have worked together to address a variety of well-being initiatives including food insecurity, lead safety, asthma and healthy habits since 2010. UnitedHealthcare and Sesame Workshop’s Growing Every Day, Every Way program offers free bilingual (English and Spanish) educational materials including:
- Food for Thought: Eating Well on a Budget, designed to help support families who are coping with uncertain or limited access to affordable and nutritious food.
- We Have the Moves, which encourages families to participate in regular physical activity to help children build strong bones and muscles, improve their social and emotional skills, and support their ability to learn new concepts.
- Ages and Stages, which provides parents with resources to help them keep infants, toddlers and preschoolers healthy by building an understanding of their child’s physical and cognitive developmental milestones.
“UnitedHealthcare is grateful for the opportunity to partner with Sesame Workshop – a leader in early childhood education – to offer tools that can help caregivers create a healthy foundation for kids,” said Tim Spilker, CEO, UnitedHealthcare Community & State. “We look forward to co-hosting the Growing Every Day, Every Way webinar that encourages children, their grandparents and families to spend National Grandparents Day eating healthy food, getting active and having fun, even if it can’t be an in-person celebration.”
Since Food for Thought launched in 2010, Sesame Workshop has unveiled independent research indicating the program has been successful in helping families increase their knowledge, beliefs and behaviors around nutrition. The research found that within four weeks, nearly three in four families participating in the program reported making positive nutritional changes including seeking information on how to cope with food insecurity, taking steps to save money on food, and making changes to promote healthy eating in the family.
“Together with UnitedHealthcare, we can help to improve the health of families across generations,” said Dr. Jeanette Betancourt, SVP, U.S. Social Impact at Sesame Workshop. “We’re thrilled to celebrate the important role that grandparents play in young children’s lives and help them create healthy habits that will stay with children for the rest of their lives.”
To learn more about Growing Every Day, Every Way, visit www.grandparentsday.com.
About Sesame Workshop
Sesame Workshop is the nonprofit educational organization behind Sesame Street, the pioneering television show that has been reaching and teaching children since 1969. Today, Sesame Workshop is an innovative force for change, with a mission to help kids everywhere grow smarter, stronger, and kinder. We’re present in more than 150 countries, serving vulnerable children through a wide range of media, formal education, and philanthropically-funded social impact programs, each grounded in rigorous research and tailored to the needs and cultures of the communities we serve. For more information, please visit www.sesameworkshop.org.
About UnitedHealthcare
UnitedHealthcare is dedicated to helping people live healthier lives and making the health system work better for everyone by simplifying the health care experience, meeting consumer health and wellness needs, and sustaining trusted relationships with care providers. In the United States, UnitedHealthcare offers the full spectrum of health benefit programs for individuals, employers, and Medicare and Medicaid beneficiaries, and contracts directly with more than 1.3 million physicians and care professionals, and 6,000 hospitals and other care facilities nationwide. The company also provides health benefits and delivers care to people through owned and operated health care facilities in South America. UnitedHealthcare is one of the businesses of UnitedHealth Group (NYSE: UNH), a diversified health care company. For more information, visit UnitedHealthcare at www.uhc.com or follow @UHC on Twitter.
Contacts
Ellen O’Brien
UnitedHealthcare
(952) 931-4969
ellen.obrien@uhc.com
