By Tracy Minkin
From Health magazine
From Health magazine
Education officials in every state were asked for school nominations based on food and nutrition, fitness and activity, health education, and healthy building materials and practices. We used rigorous criteria from the state of Wisconsin and the Alliance for a Healthier Generation’s Healthy Schools Program framework to score nominees. The top-10 schools were reviewed by our expert panel, and each panelist awarded a score to each top-10 school; these scores were added to each school’s first-round score to yield our final ranking.
Additional Reporting by Brittani Tingle
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Comments (4)
I find it interesting that the criteria apparently do not include the actual health of the students. It seems like the score is really a measure of political correctness.
This is an encouraging article. However, I am disappointed that the only comment posted thus far is a negative one. I am not sure what ‘political correctness’ has to do with the desire to improve academic performance, classroom behavior, and the physical fitness of students. Isn’t that everyone’s goal?
In our current testing-obsessed academic culture–thanks, NCLB–we now have, these brave teachers and principals should be commended for finding time for mandatory physical activity during the school day. Aren’t schools supposed to look after the mind AND the body?
Even thought the ultimate goal is to get kids healthy, I think it’s a good thing that student’s health isn’t necessarily an indicator of the healthiest school. It’s important for schools to be recognized for creating environments that will contribute to a child’s overall health. If winners were chosen based on how healthy students were, we’d lose sight of the point Health magazine is trying to make - that setting the stage is vital to getting the outcome you want.
great article! nice to see that schools continue to move in the right direction. For information on eliminating junk food from schools and current health policy updates, please visit: http://www.nojunkfood.org