Coordinator talks community development

Cleaves

Rachel Cleaves, community development coordinator in the Colorado Center for Community Development (CCCD), presented at the Environmental Protection Agency CARE Conference in Denver in November. Her talk was about LiveWell Westwood’s approach to community-based initiatives to increase access to healthy eating and active living through resident trainings in Zumba and gardening. Cleaves also is involved with the partnership between the College of Architecture and Planning and the School of Medicine.

Cleaves and Mori Krantz are co-investigators on a recently awarded $30,000 grant to fund a one-year research study entitled “Factors Influencing Participation and Cardiovascular Outcomes In a Community-Based Zumba Exercise Program.” The study will focus on health and social outcomes in Latina women from the Westwood neighborhood as a result of participation in Zumba. The award was granted on behalf of the pilot grant program, Improving Translational Research Through Community Academic Partnerships, at Colorado Clinical and Translational Sciences Institute (CCTSI), Anschutz Medical Campus.