Plan Walk/Bike to School Day in your community during October 2007

The Missouri Safe Routes to School Coalition invites all schools and communities to participate in

* International Walk to School Day on Wednesday, October 3rd, 2007
* International Walk/Bike to School Week October 1-5, 2007
* International Walk/Bike to School Month, October 2007

Walk to School Day at your local school can be instigated by a parent, a teacher, a PTA, a school principal or administrator, or even a student.

With the prevalence of childhood overweight and related diseases increasing, walking to school is a great way for kids to get some healthy exercise and have fun at the same time. What's more, families who walk to school save on gas, as well as reducing congestion and air pollution around school.

A community leader or parent who is interested in starting a Walk to School Day in a local school might coordinate with the school principal, and then, in cooperation with the school, might work to coordinate and plan the activity, designing flyers the school distributes, planning the drop-off area and routes, and helping local prizes and organize a fun snack for walkers.

To make it easy to organize an event, we made a checklist and various resources available for download below.

We ask you to encourage children who live close to school to walk with their parents on October 3, 2007 or some other designated day during the month of October.

Additionally, as an option, you may identify a "staging post" about a half-mile from school where parents living too far away can drop their kids in the care of teachers or other responsible adults who then walk the group to school. Your P.T.A. leaders may be a helpful resource in organizing an event.

Please consider joining 3,000 other schools in the United States (3,000,000 children worldwide) by participating in this program.

Resources for planning/executing a Walk/Bike to School Day (in Word format):

• Walk to School Day planning checklist
• Response form
• Drawing entry form/participation form
• Walk to School Day Flyer (generic flyer that can be modified for your event)

More Safe Routes to School and Walk to School resources are here.

These Walk to School Day materials were adapted from materials developed, refined, and successfully used for several years by PedNET, Columbia, MO, and are made available for general use through their generosity.