Ecology Center — Newsletter

As the new school year begins, students at one Ann Arbor elementary school will have the opportunity to board a very special bus for their trip to school. The bus isn’t big and yellow and it emits no exhaust, yet ideally there are two or more drivers, one in front and one in back. Further, students riding the bus may actually improve their health while also learning something new about Mother Nature and the neighborhood they live in.

The Walking School Bus, which made its trial run in May, will return to Mitchell Elementary School in September, where organizers hope it will become a popular way for kids to get to (and from) school. Here’s how it will work: Weather permitting, at least two adults will leave from the front of Mitchell School at 8 am and walk on a predetermined circular route through the neighborhood, “picking up” students along the way.

Like a regular bus, the convoy of walkers will be scheduled to arrive at various “stops” along the mapped route to add more riders. The walking bus will arrive at school on time, say organizers, delivering children who are refreshed, alert, and ready to start the school day.

The potential benefits of a walking bus are numerous, say organizers. The kids get exercise, they learn about their natural surroundings, and by not using pollution-producing vehicles, they help improve the environment. The community benefits as well as the amount of traffic around schools at crucial drop-off and pick-up times may drop, making it safer for everyone to walk. And, crimes are less likely to happen when more people are outside keeping an eye on their neighborhood.

Ann Arbor’s Walking School Bus is one component of GO! OUTDOORS, a two-year project promoting children’s sustained physical activity and interest in the natural world. GO! OUTDOORS is a partnership of the Ann Arbor Public Schools, the Ecology Center, the Michigan Department of Natural Resources, and Ann Arbor Community Recreation and Education. The group was awarded a $200,000 ‘Great Outdoors’ grant from the Community Foundation for Southeastern Michigan in Oct. 2003 as part of an initiative to get families outdoors and active.

Like other GO! OUTDOORS activities, such as after-school nature clubs, vegetable gardens, and field trips, the Walking School Bus is a program designed to appeal to children of elementary school age and their families. Key to the GO! OUTDOORS concept is the idea that people need and enjoy the outdoors; that outside physical activity at an early age builds healthy lifestyle habits and environmental respect at the same time.

Modeled in part on the Centers for Disease Control’s KidsWalk-to-School program, Ann Arbor’s Walking School Bus recognizes the health needs of kids and the potential benefits for those who participate in the program.

Three decades ago, according to the CDC in their “Guide to Promote Walking to School,” two-thirds of children walked or biked to school. Now, only 13% of all trips to school are made by walking and bicycling. With cutbacks in recess time and physical education classes, the guide points out, kids today have less opportunity to be physically active at school.

“Young people today are not as free to walk and play outdoors because our neighborhoods are no longer kid-friendly,” says the CDC. “Many of our communities have been designed to be convenient for cars, not for children.”

At home, video games, television, and the Internet provide indoor entertainment but little physical activity. Two-thirds of all kids have TVs in their rooms (one-fourth of 2- to 5-year olds), and childhood screen watching is now up to 21 hours a week

In the last three decades the number of overweight children has increased by 63%. The average 11-year-old boyweighs 11 more pounds than 30 yearsago. One in four children are now overweight or obese and at greater risk of de-veloping diabetes, heart and liver disease, arthritis, asthma, and bone problems.

Uniquely Ann Arbor

The Ann Arbor Walking School Bus is designed, like other walking bus programs around the country and the world, to address both safety and health issues. But the Ann Arbor bus adds a distinctly local touch: an environmental education component. GO! OUTDOORS organizers feel that the time spent walking to and from school is like a daily field trip, and provides an invaluable opportunity to help kids connect to their natural surroundings. When appropriate the GO! OUTDOORS naturalist, staffperson, or volunteer will engage children in conversation and active observation on various aspects of nature – birds, trees, clouds, flowers, etc.

Ann Arbor’s version of the walking bus, as well as other parts of the GO! OUTDOORS project, grew out of nine months of brainstorming and dialogue between representatives from the school district, community organizations, and the Ecology Center. The various activities – after-school clubs, field trips, service projects, and the walking bus – are now guided by a steering committee composed of Sara Aeschbach (Rec. & Ed. director), John Stahly (naturalist and Rec. & Ed. staff), Nanette Kwiatek (gardener and teacher), Patrick O’Neill (principal) and David Szczygiel (naturalist and environmental program consultant) from the AAPS, Douglas Finley (chief of education and outreach office) from the MDNR, and Ecology Center Environmental Educator, Tawny Gapinski.

The after-school nature clubs and the Walking School Bus are coordinated by Gapinski and the Ecology Center alongside Rec. & Ed. staff. Gapinski says that if the walking bus is successful at Mitchell it will most likely be expanded to Lakewood Elementary as well. The longterm goal is for GO! OUTDOORS activities, including the Walking School Bus, to become district-wide and permanent. For now, Gapinski and other organizers are following their own advice about exercise and outdoor activities: Start small, in little increments, and slowly increase intensity and duration.

Hoofin' It Gaining Ground

Ann Arbor’s Walking School Bus is one of more than 50 programs across the nation, and one of hundreds around the world, aimed at getting kids to walk or bike to school. In Chicago, for example, where 90% of the 422,000 public school children walk to school, the walking school bus is embraced as a concept to keep kids safe from gang crime.

Other programs, such as “Safe Routes to School” focus on creating a more kid friendly infrastructure – new sidewalks, signage, pedestrian bridges and crosswalks. Marin County, California, started its “Safe Routes” project in 2000 to relieve massive traffic jams near schools.
In Michigan, five elementary schools from around the state are involved in a two-year “Safe Routes to School” pilot project, funded by a grant from the Governor’s Council on Physical Fitness, Health, and Sports.

Students from Michigan and all over the world can participate in the upcoming International Walk to School Week on October 4-8 with International Walk to School Day on Wed., Oct. 6. Last year an estimated 3,000 U.S. schools participated in the Day, joining adults and children in 29 other countries.

For more information about AnnArbor’s Walking School Bus, contact Tawny Gapinski of the Ecology Center at (734) 995-5888, x111.To learn about other walking school bus programs, visit www.cdc.gov/nccdphp/dnpa/kidswalk orwww.walkingschoolbus.org. To learn about “Safe Routes to School” and International Walk to School Day/Week, visit www.walktoschool.org.

Ted Sylvester is editor of From the Ground Up.