Media Release

Tuesday 20 August 2013

Buck Shelford hosts ‘Ka Pai Kai’ healthy cooking classes at Onehunga High

Onehunga teens and their families are learning how to cook ‘delicious and nutritious’ meals in a new science initiative called Ka Pai Kai.

All Black legend Buck Shelford is providing kitchen tips at the series of Monday evening classes in Onehunga High School’s food technology room, from 6pm to 8pm.

The author of Buck Up: The Real Bloke's Guide to Getting Healthy and Living Longer is sharing stories about major changes he’s made to his own diet. Since retiring from rugby, he’s beaten cancer and shed 25 kilos in excess weight.

Ka Pai Kai was designed by University of Auckland health science students Hannah Burgess, Kamaia Pere, Sharifeh Safdari, Maria Khokhar, Vithushiya Yoganandarajah and Clyde Smith while at the 2012 LENScience Bio-Med Summer School.

The week-long residential course supporting school leavers to transition to university is funded by Gravida: National Centre for Growth and Development, the Friedlander Foundation and Te Puni Kokiri.

Students were required to apply scientific method in developing community action responses to Non Communicable Diseases such as diabetes and heart

disease. Ka Pai Kai was one of three winning proposals to receive funding for implementation in partnership with a local school this year.

ENDS

LENScience

LENScience is a unique programme for schools, bringing students and scientists together. It was established in 2006 by the founding Director of the Liggins Institute Professor Sir Peter Gluckman (now Chief Science Advisor to the Prime Minister) with a view to addressing the critical issue of the widening gap between science and society.

www.lenscience.auckland.ac.nz

The Liggins Institute

The Liggins Institute is a Large-Scale Research Institute of The University of Auckland.The Institute’s research demonstrates the importance of children having a healthy start to life and the on-going role of nutrition in promoting and supporting optimal health throughout life.

Through laboratory, clinical and population based studies, the Institute’s researchers and their international collaborators investigate problems in human health to discover why those problems occur. They then develop evidence based strategies to treat, manage or prevent them. They have established links with schools via the LENScience programme as an effective channel for translating research knowledge into community understanding, action and healthier lives.

www.liggins.auckland.ac.nz

Gravida: National Centre for Growth and Development

Gravida is a government-funded Centre of Research Excellence (CoRE). Their internationally recognised research seeks to reveal how conditions encountered in early life affect the way an individual grows and develops throughout life. It aims to advance understanding of the underlying processes involved to identify short and long term consequences for health and disease.

Promotion of science to school students – Gravida is a key contributor to the LENScience outreach initiative. The programme constitutes an important channel through which the Centre aims to build scientific literacy and community-based health awareness.

www.gravida.org.nz

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