Action for Healthy Kids was launched at the Healthy Schools Summit 2002, and is now a leading force in our nation's fight against childhood obesity. Action for Healthy Kids Teams are active in all 50 states and the District of Columbia, with thousands of active members nationwide. The collective efforts of Action for Healthy Kids Teams reach millions of American students each year, helping to improve their nutrition and increase their physical activity through school-based change.
As the number of grassroots members grows, so does participation from national organizations and government agencies involved in curbing the obesity epidemic and improving children's health. In just three years the number of Partner Organizations increased from a few dozen at Action for Healthy Kids' inception to well over sixty today. These organizations were critical to the planning and support of the second Healthy Schools Summit, which was hosted by Action for Healthy Kids in September 2005. Entitled Raising the Bar: New Challenges, New Opportunities, the Healthy Schools Summit 2005 focused on building upon the great progress that has been made in just three years.
As the Action for Healthy Kids groundswell continues, more and more initiatives and programs are underway at the state, district, and school building level to improve children's health in every aspect of the school day -- expanding school breakfast programs, increasing recess, improving school lunch options, offering more health and nutrition education, and even developing a nationally-available after-school program. In addition to their direct value to students, these initiatives serve as replicable tools for other schools through the Action for Healthy Kids' "Resources to Improve Schools" database and through continual networking within and among Teams.
We've only just begun. The Child Nutrition and WIC Reauthorization Act of 2004 mandates that school districts establish ‘wellness policies' – guidelines for school nutrition and physical activity - by the beginning of the 2006 school year. Many Action for Healthy Kids' Teams are working with districts in their states to help them draft these policies, and we've created a comprehensive web-based Wellness Policy Tool. With limited resources, schools have difficulty optimizing or even complying with such requirements. Action for Healthy Kids is here to help support schools and ensure such opportunities are fulfilled.
Commitment to Change
The guiding document of Action for Healthy Kids is our Commitment to Change, which describes the challenges we face and details the goals we have established to meet them.
Included in the Commitment to Change document are the following twelve Action Goals. Each Action for Healthy Kids Team focuses on two or three of the twelve goals to guide their efforts to make sustained improvements in nutrition and physical activity at school.
Action Goals
1. Provide age-appropriate and culturally sensitive instruction in health education and physical education that help students develop the knowledge, attitudes, skills and behaviors to adopt, maintain and enjoy healthy eating habits and a physically active lifestyle.
2. Provide students in pre-kindergarten through grade 12 with behavior-focused nutrition education integrated into the curriculum that is interactive and teaches the skills they need to adopt healthy eating habits.
3. Ensure that meals offered through all school feeding programs meet federal nutrition standards.
4. Adopt policies ensuring that all foods and beverages available on school campuses and at school events contribute toward eating patterns that are consistent with the Dietary Guidelines for Americans.
5. Provide food options that are low in fat, calories and added sugars, such as fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and low-fat or nonfat dairy foods.
6. Ensure that healthy snacks and foods are provided in vending machines, school stores and other venues within the school's control.
7. Prohibit student access to vending machines, school stores, and other venues that contain foods of minimal nutritional value and compete with healthy school meals in elementary schools and restrict access in middle, junior and high schools.
8. Provide an adequate amount of time for students to eat school meals, and schedule lunch periods at reasonable hours around midday.
9. Provide all children, from pre-kindergarten through grade 12, with quality daily physical education that helps develop the knowledge, attitudes, skills, behaviors and confidence needed to be physically active for life.
10. Provide daily recess periods for elementary school students, featuring time for unstructured but supervised active play.
11. Provide adequate co-curricular physical activity programs, including fully inclusive intramural programs and physical activity clubs.
12. Encourage the use of school facilities for physical activity programs offered by the school and/or community-based organizations outside of school hours.
