Health Promotion and Education Degree Leads to Published Children’s Book 

Sometimes, a goal is just personal. One wants to learn to crochet, get a degree, or run a 5K just because. 

That’s 39-year-old Melissa Hammons’ story, at least her initial one. After leaving college early due to the birth of her first child, Hammons vowed she would eventually return to get her bachelor’s degree — whether it helped her career or not. 

Twelve years later, she achieved that personal goal at Bellevue College after earning her Bachelor of Applied Science (BAS) in Health Promotion and Education in June 2023. And, not-so-surprisingly, meeting that goal offered career-enhancing benefits as well. 

Hammons is a small business owner running Yoga Adventure Kids NW, which conducts children’s yoga programs at 18 Eastside schools. Her business was doing fine until the pandemic hit. That’s when it occurred to her that it was a perfect time to complete her degree. Her children were now older (5 and 9 years old at the time), and she had obtained an associate degree at another community college before they were born. To complete her four-year degree, she now needed to find an affordable, interesting program that matched her busy life as a mother of two.   

She researched programs but didn’t find anything that piqued her interest until discovering the Health and Wellness (now called Health Promotion and Education) program at Bellevue College. The bachelor’s degree offered through the program is designed to prepare students to develop and put into practice programs that promote health for individuals, communities, and organizations. Students learn ways to encourage wellness and health literacy, improve health equity, and prevent injuries and disease. 

“It was the perfect combination of affordability, hybrid schedule (a mixture of remote and on-campus classes), and content for me,” Hammons said.  

Writing a Children’s Book 

It also helped her achieve another of her personal goals: to write and publish a children’s book. For her practicum (a required degree project designed to provide real-world experience) she wrote “I Show Myself Love: A Self-Care Book for Kids,” an illustrated book for children, now available on Amazon.  

Her book, designed via Canva, a program she learned in class, provides activities that kids can do to help their bodies and brains feel healthy and well. These activities promote a positive outlook on taking care of oneself from an early age. Hammons believes starting young helps build lifelong physical and mental well-being. Her book is selling well, and she’s planning on applying lessons learned in digital marketing at Bellevue College to make it even more successful. 

Improving her Business 

While getting her degree was a goal Hammons did for personal reasons, it reaped extra rewards she didn’t expect, both in marketing her business and in improving her company’s offering.  

“I learned a lot of digital marketing tactics and was able to grow my business to a wider set of schools, including making strides into the public school system,“ Hammons said. “And I gained a new appreciation for making my classes accessible to a wide range of learning styles, backgrounds, and abilities.” 

Hammons said there were invisible barriers for some families who sought out her services, but she learned what those were and how to fix them during her time at Bellevue College.  

“I started thinking about children (and their parents) from different backgrounds and cultures and making sure they felt welcomed,” she said. “Now, parents of neurodiverse children can feel comfortable knowing that their kids’ unique needs will be met in their yoga class.”  

Hammons is the mother of two neurodiverse children herself. However, through her degree program, she learned how to better serve this population, ensuring all kids could find success in class. 

Finding Support 

“I loved all my peers; the little community in our cohort was great; it felt like a group full of trust,” Hammons said. “Those are friends I can be friends with forever, who also share my passion for health and wellness and how it can make a difference in our community. “  

Several professors made her college experience worthwhile: Hammons cited both program chair Tamara Boynton Howard’s practicum and Peter Prescott’s Outdoor Recreation Leadership classes as particularly inspiring. 

Hammons got through the last two years of her degree with the help of several grants and scholarships, including a scholarship from the Bellevue College Foundation and grants made possible through federal financial aid. 

“My degree from Bellevue College enabled me to achieve both my practical goals of getting a degree and writing a book and my aspirational goals of helping people start living healthy lives when they are young,” Hammons said. “I appreciate all the support I received that made it possible!”