Hopkins School District #270

06/15/2010

Four Hopkins schools—Eisenhower Elementary/XinXing Academy, Hopkins High School, L.H. Tanglen Elementary, and Meadowbrook Elementary—have received national Bronze Awards from the Alliance for a Healthier Generation for their focus on healthy eating and physical activity.  All schools in the Hopkins District are working towards earning the Bronze Award for the 2010-2011 school year.  If each of our schools achieve the Bronze Award, we will be the only district in the nation to have all schools in the District win the award.

Representatives from the four schools, including Nancy Marcy and Bobbi Pointer from Hopkins High School, Erin Ley from L.H. Tanglen, Mindy Erdal and Greta Evans-Becker from Meadowbrook Elementary, and Jill Rost and Vicky White from Eisenhower/XinXing Academy, received the awards, Tuesday, June 15, in New York City. 

About the award

This year, the Alliance for a Healthier Generation, founded by the American Heart Association and the William J. Clinton Foundation, honored 178 schools from across the country for their efforts to transform their schools into healthier place for students and staff. Hopkins' four schools were the only Minnesota schools to receive national recognition for their efforts.

To earn this award, Hopkins' schools created healthy eating and physical activity programs that met or exceeded stringent standards set by the Alliance for a Healthier Generation's Healthy Schools Program, which provides free support and technical assistance to more than 9,000 schools nationwide to help them reverse the national trend in childhood obesity.

Highlights of the schools' initiatives include:

Eisenhower Elementary/XinXing Academy

The Eisenhower Elementary/XinXing Academy Wellness Council stepped in front of the camera and into the cafeteria to ensure that students ate their vegetables. Each week in April, a group of six 4th-graders and 5th-graders dressed up as a different featured vegetable on Ike News, a closed-circuit weekly television program. The students, led by school nurse Vicky White and school counselor Jill Rost, described for their peers where the vegetable was originally grown and its health benefits.

In the cafeteria, the district's Nutrition Department served the featured vegetable several different ways over the course of the week, so students could taste the different textures and flavors possible with just one vegetable. To encourage students to try the featured vegetable, role models from the community visited the school and distributed samples. The role models included local firefighters and athletes from the University of Minnesota. The Wellness Council hopes these efforts will increase students' awareness and consumption of vegetables.

Hopkins High School

The staff and faculty at Hopkins High School have collaborated on a massive undertaking that included a redesign of the school cafeteria, development of an aerobics center, and creation of new courses in health and culinary arts.

The cafeteria offers a variety of diverse healthy food options including made-while-you-wait sandwiches, a daily salad bar and an ethnic eatery featuring foods from around the world. In addition to the healthy food choices, Hopkins applied for and received a federal Physical Education Program (PEP) grant, which has contributed to major changes in the school environment. With those funds, the school installed its fitness and aerobics center that includes a ropes course, which is now open to the community.

L.H. Tanglen Elementary

Creating a student wellness council that would go to bat for healthy changes proved critical for L.H. Tanglen Elementary School's success in adapting current policies and practices. The school invited 5th-grade and 6th-grade students to join the council, along with parents, teachers, the school's nurse and guidance counselor, and a representative from the before- and after-school program. The council reviewed existing policies on wellness and shared new ideas with the school principal. Two significant changes for the 2010-11 school year were made: changing the school day schedule so that recess takes place before lunch, and eliminating unhealthy food treats during birthday celebrations.

L.H. Tanglen Elementary also hosts a student running program that provides non-food incentives for completing laps around the adjacent high school track. Next year, it plans to decorate the school cafeteria with posters that promote healthy eating and to take more steps to promote increased physical activity.

Meadowbrook Elementary

Meadowbrook Elementary School joined the Healthy Schools Program this year. While this may not seem like much, this was perhaps the most difficult decision the school had to make. Meadowbrook already had a newly rearranged schedule for recess, had just added more physical education time, and started a school garden.

"It would have been easy to stop there," said Principal Greta Evans-Becker. "But once I decided to join the Healthy Schools Program, all the rest of the decisions were easy because I had a framework to follow."

After joining the program, Meadowbrook first created a student wellness committee consisting of students, staff members, and parents. All classes began offering daily brain breaks, which included exercising, yoga, balancing on stability balls, or jogging on the playground. A new policy was implemented that eliminated edible birthday treats. Room parties had a healthier focus with yogurt, grapes and pretzels replacing candies and cakes. The school carnival served water with fruit slices instead of soda, and the school bingo event served whole-wheat crust pizza and milk.

Creating healthy environments

"Schools across the country are working hard to provide healthier environments for students while facing the challenges of decreased budgets and time," said Ginny Ehrlich, executive director of the Alliance for a Healthier Generation. "The successes of these schools confirm that, despite these issues, it is possible to transform a school culture when staff, students and parents lead the charge in making healthy changes."