Let the Celebrations Begin: More than 1,400 Schools Hosting Events during Every Kid Healthy™ Week
By: Rob Bisceglie, CEO Action for Healthy Kids
We are in the middle of Every Kid Healthy™ Week and the excitement is tangible! With so many momentous changes and developments in school nutrition, physical activity and wellness just in the past year, schools deserve the opportunity to spotlight the great efforts they are making to improve the health of their students.
Every Kid Healthy Week has grown from an idea to a full-fledged movement, and the size of it today is truly astounding. Action for Healthy Kids launched Every Kid Healthy Week in 2013 with just 83 events taking place that year reaching 26,000 students in 22 states. It has now grown to more than 1,400 events in 39 states involving more than 20,000 parent and volunteer participants and 730,000 students. And just as every school and student is unique, when it comes to Every Kid Healthy Week events, one size does not fit all.
This year’s roster of events includes parents and kids dressing as health and nutrition super heroes at Scotts Branch Elementary in Windsor Mill, MD, while students are creating passport booklets to use as they travel from booth to booth at a health fair at Learning Center at North Northwood in Cincinnati, OH. Glendale Elementary School in Glendale, WV is hosting a family fitness night complete with a climbing wall and healthy eating activities for students and parents. Penn Yan Elementary School in Pen Yan, NY is celebrating with a dance and roller-skating party. More traditional events include healthy food taste tests, fun runs, cardio activities on the playground and planting school gardens.
No matter which route a school chooses, they all have the same destination: the goal of teaching and showing students how important it is to make healthy choices. These lessons build on what students are already experiencing through their school’s health and wellness programs during the year and will help to set them on the path to academic and life-long success.
For more tips on getting active visit www.togethercounts.com.
Last year, one of our favorite events was a Family Fitness Night hosted by Spencer Elementary in Chicago. Planned by the school’s wellness team, the event had students, parents, and teachers running from healthy eating stations to pick-up basketball games to cooking demonstrations. It was the perfect mix to deliver important messages of physical activity (kids should try to get at least 60 minutes per day) and healthy eating (get those servings of fruits, veggies, low-fat dairy and whole grains). At a time when one in three kids in the U.S. are overweight or obese, it was gratifying to see kids enjoying these activities.
Such a coordinated nationwide event is not possible without our supporters and like-minded organizations, including Healthy Weight Commitment Foundation. Through their free Together Counts™ program resources and our Every Kid Healthy tools, you too can join the movement to make Every Kid Healthy and ready to learn. Take the Every Kid Healthy Pledge and even bring the Every Kid Healthy movement into your school using our Every Kid Healthy Week Toolkit or our free, online school health program, Game On. Check out Action for Healthy Kids Facebook page all week for inspiring Every Kid Healthy Week success stories and photos from the front lines. And remember: we’re all in this together!
Action for Healthy Kids® is a nationwide grassroots network that supports school-based foods, nutrition education, physical education and physical activity that lead to lifelong healthy habits and academic success. With resources, funding opportunities, expert technical assistance, and our flagship program, Game On, we provide full support to schools, administrators and parents to develop healthy school environments for children. To learn more about the ways our 85,000+ volunteer network is helping to make Every Kid Healthy™, visit us at www.ActionforHealthyKids.org, on Facebook and on Twitter.