About

eatdinner.org is a non-profit organization dedicated to helping families make the commitment to eat dinner together on a regular basis. American families are confronted with many urgent social, economic and health challenges today, including obesity, teenage alcohol and drug use, tight budgets and time constraints made worse by the recession, and feelings of disconnectedness among family and friends. Family dinner can be a solution to many of these problems. The simple act of having regular family meals has been shown time and again to have positive effects on children, teens, and their parents on a broad range of issues related to social, emotional and physical development.

eatdinner.org Initiatives:

• Making Family Dinner Work: Workshops and presentations, tailored to the audience, on the benefits of family dinner, healthy eating for families and how to incorporate healthy habits into our busy lives. Co-founder of the Blog for Family Dinner Project, which hosts tips, advice and stories from bloggers to support families in making the commitment to family dinner. 

• Research Consultations, Parent Outreach and Education: We work with researchers, foundations, policymakers and business leaders to design effective parent outreach and education programs to promote healthy behaviors among parents and children. We conduct independent research and can also help you design evaluations, surveys or focus groups to learn more about family eating patterns and/or the effectiveness of health education programs. 

• Family Dinner Survey: Our Family Dinner Survey provides a detailed look at how families incorporate family dinner into their busy lives, including information on the challenges they face and what resources are most helpful to them.  You can find out more about the survey and recent findings here.
 

Grace R. Freedman, PhD - eatdinner.org Founder

Founded by Dr. Grace R. Freedman in 2007, eatdinner.org is a resource for parents, the media, policymakers, researchers and philanthropic leaders. We hope to give parents practical advice and information, based in research, that they can use in their daily lives. In addition, we aim to spread news and evidence about the positive effects of family dinner through traditional media and social networking. 


eatdinner.org is non-religious and non-denominational and we believe that family dinner has health, social, and cultural benefits for children, families, and individuals of all socioeconomic and cultural backgrounds.

eatdinner.org will partner with like-minded organizations whenever possible to spread the message about family dinner. Eat dinner with your family!

Follow us on Twitter: @eatdinner   @blog4famdinner
Become a Fan of Eatdinner on Facebook and  Blog for Family Dinner on Facebook
For media inquires, workshop/presentation requests, or questions about research consultations, please email: grace [at] eatdinner [dot] org.

Grace Freedman and Eatdinner.org is a founding partner of the Blog For Family Dinner Project.

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Bio
Dr. Grace R. Freedman has extensive research experience in public health and public policy. Her current research interests include how family dinner can improve children's health and well-being, including preventing childhood obesity and reducing problems associated with teen alcohol and drug use. She has written extensively on the health benefits of family dinner and on the social, economic, political and cultural interconnections of the food system and healthy eating.

Dr. Freedman holds masters and doctorate degrees in Sociomedical Sciences (Columbia University) and has taught Public Policy at New York University. She has assisted with public health research at Columbia University (HIV/AIDS, disaster preparedness, resiliency in women and children) and The New York Academy of Medicine (medicine and public health collaborations). She has also worked in private industry exploring innovative ways to present complex biomedical and health information (Thinkmap, Inc). She is the author of a history textbook for high school students and of several scholarly articles. Dr. Freedman is married, has three children ranging in age from kindergartner to teen, and live in Brooklyn, NY.  (Full C.V. available on request.)