Jenni Klufa

Jenni Klufa is the Youth Associate State Extension Specialist for Oklahoma State University's Community Nutrition Education Programs in the Department of Nutritional Sciences in the College of Education and Human Sciences. She completed her M.S. in Health and Human Performance and her M.S. in Nutritional Sciences along with the Dietetic Internship at OSU. Jenni is a Registered Dietitian.

As an Oklahoma native and a three-time OSU alum, she has a passion for improving the health of her home state. In her current position, she provides statewide Extension leadership planning, creating, implementing and evaluating food and nutrition education programs for youth across the state of Oklahoma. Jenni also enjoys serving as a member of the NSCI Department Faculty. Her previous work experience includes working for the Oklahoma State Department of Health WIC Service as a Nutrition Therapist and as the Nutrition Services Director for a fitness and wellness club in Tulsa, OK.

Jenni is an active member of the Society for Nutrition Education and Behavior, the Association of SNAP-Ed Nutrition Networks and Other Implementing Agencies, OSU CE-FCS Ambassadors, and the National Extension Association of Family and Consumer Sciences. She has previously served on the Oklahoma Academy of Nutrition & Dietetics Board of Directors, served as the President of the North Central District Dietetic Association, and completed the Oklahoma Public Health Leadership Institute Fellowship in 2017.

Jenni is working to earn her PhD in Nutritional Sciences with a planned completion date of December 2024.

Research Interests:

As Oklahoma's overweight and obesity rates increase, the need to provide practical and effective nutrition education to improve the health of Oklahomans also increases. Jenni believes that understanding and applying healthy nutrition choices is a vital life skill which should be developed in childhood. Her Extension work includes identifying statewide nutrition education program priorities to improve partnerships with schools, summer camps and other youth group sites reaching limited resource and culturally diverse participants.

Planned Dissertation Research
Obesity in childhood often leads to obesity through adolescence into adulthood. Obesity is a major risk factor for a person to develop chronic health conditions including cardiovascular disease, stroke, cancer, and diabetes mellitus. With the state of Oklahoma consistently ranking in the bottom 10 unhealthiest states, an urgent need exists to identify effective obesity preventative actions that can lead to significant improvement in Oklahoma's health outcomes. These high-impact strategies should be implemented through schools and communities supporting healthy behavior choices. A promising strategy is through policy, system, and environmental (PSE) change interventions. Community nutrition PSE interventions are effective strategies for promoting healthy diet for chronic disease prevention. For these PSE interventions to be effective, they must be implemented based on the community's readiness for change. Assessing community readiness is an approach to planning community-based interventions aimed at improving a health concern. I am investigating how Oklahoma Elementary schools' readiness for nutrition PSE change interventions impacts students' nutrition behaviors.