October 17, 2016
STRIPED director S. Bryn Austin is quoted in this BuzzFeed article on the questionable practice of labeling children’s clothing based on size (i.e., “plus,” “husky,” or “slim”). Check it out here and read this article from the Harvard Chan School on how labels like these may be stigmatizing and contribute to body image issues among children.
September 22, 2016
Be sure to check out this webcast from Eating Disorders, Mental Health and Body Image: The Public Health Connections, a forum at the Harvard Chan School featuring STRIPED director S. Bryn Austin, and take a look at this article in the Harvard Gazette covering the forum to learn about the multifaceted nature of eating disorders and how we can prevent them!
September 16, 2016
This week, STRIPED director S. Bryn Austin took part in two historic meetings in Washington, DC, along with other national leaders from the eating disorders community. One meeting at the Food and Drug Administration, on Tuesday, Sept. 13, addressed the eating disorders community’s concerns about the newly approved obesity treatment device AspireAssist. The second meeting, on Wednesday, Sept. 14, was the first-ever White House Roundtable on Eating Disorders. This meeting focused on the need for improved treatment access through mental health parity, expanded training for health professionals for early detection, and increased federal funding for research.
September 16, 2016
Don’t miss this letter by STRIPED Collaborating Mentor Rachel Rodgers, STRIPED director S. Bryn Austin, founder of Model Alliance Sara Ziff, and co-directors of Model Alliance Áine Campbell, Madeline Hill, and Meredith Hattam, written in response to Don’t Blame the Fashion World for the Cult of Skinny – Even Roald Dahl Plays His Part, an article written in The Guardian. Check out the letter, Size Diversity Plan Can Help Body Image, and read about how the fashion industry and its media representations play an important role in eating disorders.
September 9, 2016
STRIPED director Bryn Austin will be featured on a panel of experts at Eating Disorders, Mental Health and Body Image: The Public Health Connections, a forum at the Harvard Chan School. Speakers at this event will explore the multi-faceted nature of eating disorders and discuss body image, risk factors, treatment, prevention, and more. Be sure to attend in person or watch the online webcast here!
August 31, 2016
STRIPED congratulates East Tennessee State University (ETSU) on receiving the inaugural Indoor Tan-Free Skin Smart Campus Award from the National Council on Skin Cancer Prevention’s Indoor Tan-Free Skin Smart Campus Initiative! ETSU serves as a role model for colleges and universities across the nation and works to provide a safe and healthy environment for students, faculty, and staff by adopting the Skin Smart Campus indoor tan-free college campus policy. Learn how to tackle these issues in the classroom with our teaching case, Some Skin in the Game: Negotiating the End of a Campus Health Menace, here!
August 26, 2016
Check out this coverage of STRIPED faculty Jerel Calzo’s study, Gender Conformity and Use of Laxatives and Muscle-Building Products in Adolescents and Young Adults! Read the article here to learn more about how gender conformity is linked with laxative and muscle-building product use to change body shape and size.
August 25, 2016
We have just published our latest teaching case, “Patina of Glamour: Forging Alliances to Investigate the Underside of the Fashion Industry!” Be sure to check it out here and learn how community-based participatory research can be used to develop community partnerships to take on difficult problems like those faced by professional fashion models!
August 23, 2016
Be sure to read this blog post, Transforming Case-Method Teaching for Online Platforms, by STRIPED faculty Holly Gooding and STRIPED director S. Bryn Austin on our work to transform STRIPED teaching cases to interactive and innovative e-modules. This project will allow students and educators anywhere in the world to access STRIPED cases and learn from our curriculum! Stay tuned as we pilot a prototypal e-learning module this fall and move on to our entire case library!
August 1, 2016
Congrats to STRIPED faculty Jerel Calzo, who is featured in the New York Times article, Attention, Teenagers: Nobody Really Looks Like That, for his recent study, Gender Conformity and Use of Laxatives and Muscle-Building Products in Adolescents and Young Adults. Shout-out to STRIPED Collaborating Mentor Rachel Rodgers, who is also quoted in this article. Check out the article here to read about the link between gender conformity and laxative and muscle-building product use to modify body shape and size. Keep up the good work, Jerel and Rachel!
August 1, 2016
Check out these podcasts from the Centre for Appearance Research on the importance of body image research! Listen in to episode 4 to learn why body image and appearance are social justice issues and check out this bonus episode featuring STRIPED director S. Bryn Austin’s keynote address at the Appearance Matters 7 Conference on policy translation research and training to prevent body dissatisfaction. Special thanks to Nadia Craddock of the Centre for putting these together!
July 29, 2016
The latest STRIPED newsletter has just been published! Check it out here to read about what we have been up to!
June 28, 2016
STRIPED director S. Bryn Austin gave the keynote address, Accelerating Progress in Prevention of Body Dissatisfaction: A Call for Policy Translation Research and Training, at the Appearance Matters Conference in Bristol, UK. Thank you to Eleanor Beer for this amazing graphic on the keynote address!
June 2, 2016
World Eating Disorders Action Day was on June 2, 2016! Activists from around the world joined together to increase awareness and understanding of eating disorders as serious, treatable illnesses. Learn more about how you can get involved here!
May 25, 2016
Congratulations to STRIPED trainee and founder and executive director of Model Alliance Sara Ziff on being nominated for the Barbara Jordan Award for Women’s Leadership! This award from the Women and Public Policy Program at the Harvard Kennedy School honors student commitment to building community and serving as a role model for other women aspiring to be leaders. Keep up the good work, Sara!
May 24, 2016
Huge congratulations to all of our graduating STRIPED trainees and to STRIPED faculty Jerel Calzo! Thank you for all your amazing work with STRIPED and best of luck on your future endeavors!
Jerel Calzo, PhD, MPH, Harvard Chan School
Elizabeth Cheever, MS, Harvard Chan School
Anvita Kulkarni, MS, Harvard Chan School
Aryn Phillips, MPH, Harvard Chan School
Marysa Sheren, EdM, Harvard Graduate School of Education
Suzanne Wintner, MPH, Harvard Chan School
Sara Ziff, MPP, Harvard Kennedy School
Bon voyage to Trine Tetlie Eik-Nes, who will be returning to Norway next week to resume her doctoral studies!
May 16, 2016
All five installments of CNN Money’s investigative series on exploitation in the modeling industry, Runway Injustice, have been released! Read The Dark Side, Outrageous Costs, The Housing Trap, Inside Look, and Horrifying Scams and check out the video here to learn why we need California AB 2539 to protect models now!
May 12, 2016
Read about The Outrageous Cost of Being a Model and The ‘Model Apartment’ Trap in CNN Money‘s second and third installments of its 5-part investigative series on the modeling industry, Runway Injustice, or check out the video here. Learn why California AB 2539 is needed to change this problem here and stay tuned for more from this new series!
May 6, 2016
California AB 2539 is featured on the Harvard Chan School podcast, This Week in Health. Tune in to Making the Modeling Industry Safer to hear from STRIPED director S. Bryn Austin and founder and executive director of the Model Alliance Sara Ziff on why this groundbreaking new legislation is so important.
May 5, 2016
Economic exploitation of models is a pressing problem in the fashion industry, as shown in this CNN Money article, How the modeling industry exploits young and vulnerable workers. Read more about this issue and see why California AB 2539, a collaboration between Assemblymember Marc Levine, Model Alliance, National Eating Disorders Association, and STRIPED, is so urgently needed to protect models.
April 29, 2016
Learn about our work to regulate the dietary supplements industry and target dangerous products sold for weight loss and muscle building with a visual presentation of our Research-to-Policy Translation paper featuring the Stop Feeding Kids Lies Campaign!
April 26, 2016
The Indoor Tan-Free Skin Smart Campus Initiative, which works with U.S. universities and colleges to promote skin cancer prevention policy and education on school campuses, has launched their website! Check out their education resources featuring our STRIPED teaching case, Some Skin in the Game: Negotiating the End of a Campus Health Menace, here.
April 25, 2016
California AB 2539 is featured in the Harvard Chan School News in the article, California Introduces Legislation to Regulate Modeling Industry. Read more about STRIPED’s work to get this important legislation passed here!
April 19, 2016
Members of the STRIPED team traveled to Capitol Hill for the Eating Disorders Coalition Congressional Lobby Day in support of the Anna Westin Act! This bill would provide training for health professionals and teachers to learn about eating disorders intervention and prevention, require the Federal Trade Commission to investigate the deleterious effects of digitally altered images on body image, and ensure that health insurance companies provide full coverage for eating disorders treatment. We are excited that STRIPED had the opportunity to advocate for this important legislation!
April 6, 2016
California AB 2539 was passed by the State Assembly Committee on Labor and Employment! Special thanks to Assemblymember Marc Levine for his leadership and to STRIPED’s advocacy partners, Model Alliance and NEDA, for their excellent teamwork at the California Assembly to score this crucial first victory for the bill!! Take a look at these articles covering the bill from the International Business Times, Reuters, Sacramento Bee, and Capitol Public Radio, and check out STRIPED director S. Bryn Austin’s comments on the importance of this bill in the San Jose Mercury News.
April 1, 2016
California AB 2539 was featured on the Today Show! Check out the clip here and learn more about this groundbreaking initiative to protect fashion model health from California Assemblymember Marc Levine, STRIPED, Model Alliance, and the National Eating Disorders Association.
March 28, 2016
STRIPED director S. Bryn Austin was featured in From the Runway to the Factory Floor: Labor Rights, Safety & Public Health, on March 22, at the Harvard Kennedy School. Other panelists were Kalpona Akter, executive director of the Bangladesh Center for Worker Solidarity (BCWS), Iskra Lawrence, model and ambassador of Aerie’s anti-retouching, body positive campaign, Annemarie Strassel, Director of Communications for Unite Here, a workers union, and Ashley Mears, Associate Professor of Sociology at Boston University. Panelists discussed worker rights in the garment and fashion industries and addressed steps toward change. Special thanks to the Model Alliance and founder and executive director Sara Ziff for sponsoring and organizing this panel and to all the other panelists for their important work and leadership. Check out clips from the event below! Thanks to Patricia Garcia-Rios for the video footage!
March 8, 2016
Read the latest from the Orange County Register on California AB 2539, a bill protecting fashion model health and wellbeing. Drs. Jerel Calzo and Bryn Austin comment on the importance of this new legislation and the dangers of eating disorders and coerced starvation in the fashion industry for both men and women.
March 7, 2016
STRIPED faculty Dr. Jerel Calzo is quoted in “The Always Hungry Teenage Boy,” a new blog post in the New York Times! Calzo comments on male body image and the dangers of excess protein consumption, especially in the form of protein supplements. Read the blog post here to learn how we can ensure that adolescent boys are eating in a healthy way.
February 23, 2016
With the leadership of California Assemblymember Marc Levine, California has just taken a huge step toward protecting the health and rights of fashion models! A new bill, California AB 2539, has been filed in the state legislature that would protect the well-being of fashion models and clarify that models are employees rather than independent contractors, ensuring that models are granted worker protection rights that all employees have in the U.S. This bill was sparked by STRIPED legal research led by Katherine Record, STRIPED Collaborating Mentor, reported in the recent American Journal of Public Health article “Paris thin: A call to regulate life-threatening starvation of runway models in the U.S. fashion industry.” Special thanks to Cassandra Soltis, an attorney at Starbucks and a dedicated advocate who volunteered her time with STRIPED to carry out the legal research supporting this bill. We’re very excited about this major legislative advance achieved through our academic-community-government partnership with the National Eating Disorders Association, Model Alliance, and Assemblymember Levine. Stay tuned for more news on this exciting new policy initiative and check out the other great events happening now during National Eating Disorders Awareness Week!
February 11, 2016
STRIPED is in Newsweek magazine spreading the word about the occupational hazards fashion runway models face. In this new article, “For Runway Models, High Fashion Means a Dangerously Low BMI,” STRIPED director Bryn Austin comments on coerced starvation in the fashion industry. Read more about how we can address this problem in this editorial in the American Journal of Public Health by STRIPED Collaborating Mentor Katherine Record and Austin.
February 5, 2016
STRIPED has just been awarded a new grant from the Harvard Initiative for Learning and Teaching for our project “Transforming team-learning teaching cases in public health for online platforms: An e-learning module development project.” We can’t wait to get started transforming our STRIPED teaching cases on eating disorders prevention and thank HILT for this exciting opportunity!
January 21, 2016
Why are body image and appearance social justice issues? Listen in to STRIPED director Bryn Austin’s conversation with Nadia Craddock of the Centre for Appearance Research in this podcast, episode #4, for the upcoming Appearance Matters conference in London.
