District aims for more activity

By DAVID MARTIN

Editor

After three years and more than $650,000 spent in training and equipment purchases, preliminary wellness results amongst students in Green River are looking good.

Three years ago, Sweetwater County School District No. 2 received a federal PEP grant totaling $662,000 towards improving physical activity within the district. PEP grants are often used to improve physical activity programs within school districts. In Wyoming, eight districts, including Sweetwater No.2 have received approximately $3 million for improvements. Much of the money awarded to Green River went to equipment, such as building bouldering walls in the elementary schools, cycling and weight room equipment, and heart rate monitors. Some funds also supported activity clubs such as the Jackson Elementary School running club.

Nancy Eklund, the PEP grant director for the district, said physical activity standards rotate around the key principles of nutrition, making sure a person participates in at least 60 minutes of activity a day and maintaining cardiovascular fitness. The grant has also lead to a reworking of physical education goals, which while focusing on learning some sports-related skills, place a larger emphasis on physical activity.

The grant’s use in training has lead to the creation of periods known as brain breaks for elementary-aged students. Eklund said the breaks help break up lessons and keep oxygen flowing to the brain.

“Studies have proven that exercise is like Miracle Grow for the brain,” she said.

For the future, Eklund says traditional classrooms featuring rows of students sitting in desks throughout the day are being filtered out in favor of classrooms that offer ways of being active throughout the day.

The district plans to experiment with a kinetic classroom, which utilizes medicine balls for seats and desks with petals built into them. A third-grade class at Truman Elementary School will serve as a test site for the kinetic classroom idea.

If the idea pans out, Eklund said similar equipment could be installed in K-12 classrooms throughout the district.