Giving Compass' Take:

• Ashley Nguyen explains how GirlTrek is working to improve the health of African-American women who have been set up for health failure. 

• How can funders increase participation in physical activities among people who come from largely sedentary families? 

• Read about a flexible model for investing in healthy community transformation. 

Epidemiologist Carmen Harris has seen how public health changes and improves lives.

I’ve seen the beautiful side of when you change the expectations or you change the narrative. You literally change a generation of health in your family.

Everybody in her family — with the exception of her dad — smoked. Her grandfather died of Alzheimer’s disease and lung cancer.

No one in her family smokes anymore.

When her aunts and uncles needed to lose weight, Harris saw them shed pounds. She grew up playing soccer and walking with her mother and sister. Her dad ran in 5K and 10K races, and he remains active today. Now, when Harris visits her aunts and uncles, she’s expected to hit the senior center with them.

Black families — including Harris’s — have dealt with generations of systemic oppression that have contributed to poor health among African American communities. They were not set up to succeed.

Harris is now the chief of social impact and strategic partnerships at GirlTrek, a nonprofit that encourages African American women to take control of their health, families, and communities by walking. There are now 647 GirlTrek teams across the United States.

Read the full article on African American women's health by Ashley Nguyen at The Lily.