Field Placement: Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI)
Location: Washington DC
Preceptor: Dr. Margo Wootan
Student Name: Laura Hoyos
Year: 2003

My internship took place during the fall of 2003 at the Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI). Located in Washington DC, CSPI is a nonprofit organization that works to improve the public’s health through its work on food, nutrition, food-safety, and alcohol issues.

I worked within CSPI’s Nutrition Policy Project, which is headed by Dr. Margo Wootan. The Nutrition Policy Project works with concerned citizens, health professionals, government officials and other nonprofit organizations to strengthen national, state and local policies and programs that promote nutrition and physical activity. My preceptor was Joy Johanson, who is a nutrition policy associate and is one of four people that work on the Nutrition Policy Project. My internship consisted of lobbying for nutrition labeling at restaurants, entering data gathered by CSPI’s School Vending Survey, and creating the layout design, as well as proofreading Anyone’s Guess, a report on nutrition information at restaurants.

On November 2003, CSPI helped Representative DeLauro introduce the Menu Education and Labeling (MEAL) Act of 2003. I lobbied for this bill by calling half of the members of congress and asking them to become original co-sponsors of the MEAL Act. I followed these phone calls, by sending faxes and e-mails with additional information on the bill. A similar bill, called the Nutrition Information at Restaurants Act of 2003, was also introduced to the Washington DC council earlier this year. For this bill, I mailed and faxed letters to the DC’s Councilmembers asked them to support this bill. I also did an assessment of the total number of chain restaurants that had an outlet in Washington DC, in order to get an idea of this would affect the restaurant industry. Additionally, I assessed the total number of restaurants and number of chain restaurants in Washington DC’s Ward 1, and used this information to lobby Councilmember Jim Graham, who presides over Ward 1, for support of this bill.

Part of my internship consisted of entering the data collected by CSPI’s School Vending Survey. This was a national survey, which assessed the number of vending machines in middle schools and high schools, as well as the quantity and quality of beverages and snacks sold to students. I created three spreadsheets, one of which contained the name, grade level, and location of the schools, while the other two had all the information on high schools and middle schools separately.

I also worked on the final editing stages of Dr. Margo Wootan’s report on nutrition labeling called Anyone’s Guess. My contribution to this report was to create the final layout of the text and pictures, create PDF files to be posted on the Internet and for the printing press, as well as checking citations and references in the report.

Back to CHS Field Studies Placement Index | Back to CHS Field Studies | Back to Field Studies Home