Go!Healthy is directed by The Children’s Aid Society and is aimed at combating obesity in children, teens and adults by teaching them about the joys of fresh, delicious and healthful foods. Go!Healthy is “food education” that makes healthful foods fun and accessible for children and families in New York’s low-income neighborhoods. Hands-on cooking, health education, yoga (pictured) and learning to be “conscious consumers” helps Go!Healthy turn the tide of unhealthy eating.

New York’s Children Aid Society also launched Go!Kids in 2003, an early childhood obesity prevention program for three- to five-year-olds. Currently at six sites in Manhattan and the Bronx, Go!Kids will be implemented at four additional Children’s Aid locations in New York in 2009, as well as at eight external Head Start programs. Go!Kids was recently featured on Rachael Ray’s non-profit organization website, Yum-o.org. These important educational programs continue the fight for the health, and future health, of thousands of needy children.

Charles Loring Brace, the founder of the New York’s Children Aid Society was the leader of the Orphan Train model. He believed that in order to give children a chance of escaping a lifetime of suffering, that they should be placed with morally upright farm families. Charles Brace’s work with the Orphan Train movement is fascinating history – living history – as the lives and legacies of his efforts continue today.

The Orphan Train Heritage Society of America Inc (OTHSA) is an organization formed in 1987 to provide a clearinghouse of information of the lives and legacy of the Orphan Train experience. OTHSA maintains the Orphan Train Riders Research Center, a museum with an archive of newspapers, census records, oral histories, letters, and photographs pertaining to the Orphan Train accounts. These genealogists and historians seek to salvage and share information on the Orphan Train riders, and the extended biological families that are alive today.

An estimated 30,000 children were homeless in New York City in the 1850s, when Charles L. Brace began this historic effort. That’s a lot of personal stories, and after a century and a half, generation after generation of families tie their roots back to the Orphan Trains. For more on the stories of Orphan Train riders, click here.

easy access to health care.

Charles Loring Brace, founder of  The Children’s Aid Society stated that “When medical care is convenient and accessible, more children live healthier lives.” This may be why, along with support from the New York Times, in1872, The Children’s Aid Society employed teams of nurses and physicians to visit sick children in tenements, establishing the model for Visiting Nurses Services.

• And why in, 1901, The Children’s Aid Society employed the first school nurse in any New York City school.

• And why in, 1906, the first free school dental clinic in the United States was established by The Children’s Aid Society in New York (and why, by 1913, there was a dental clinic in every one of its schools).

And it’s also why today every child who comes into one of The Children Aid Society’s school and community clinics receives comprehensive and coordinated examinations and treatment. The health and mental health services of New York’s Children’s Aid Society remains on the cutting edge of children’s services. Many of its successful program models are replicated across the nation; adapted by public schools throughout the U.S., and across the globe.

With revolutionary ideas about the importance of the early education and welfare of children, Charles Loring Brace pioneered efforts on behalf of impoverished children.  The legacy of the novel ideas that the Children’s Aid Society in New York introduced continues today in programs all across our country.  For over 150 years, these ground-breaking programs have astonished and amazed with their innovation, helping children at risk grow up healthy and productive.

With unique vision, New York’s Children’s Aid Society introduced many progressive programs in their schools that today are commonplace. Look at the National School Lunch Program, the federal program that provides free or reduced-price lunches to students based on the student’s household income.  The Children’s Aid Society in New York started their free school lunch program over 150 years ago to destitute children, recognizing that a child can’t learn well when he or she is hungry.

And there is the Head Start program, founded in 1965, which benefits children by enrolling them into instructional settings at the age of 3 in order to promote school readiness.  Children’s Aid opened the first Head Start classroom in New York. Early childhood education has been a cornerstone of New York’s Children’s Aid Society since its inception in 1853. The passion to champion children at risk in the 21^st century continues, with program-innovation and imagination.