Create parent advocates by sharing information with parents at Back to School Night

A story from Utah

Parents can be powerful advocates for their child’s health and learning and help influence a healthy school environment. Tim Best, Healthy Lifestyles Director for Davis School District in Utah, shared his strategy to engage parents through school-wide events, like Back to School Night.

Key Takeaways

Keep parents informed on healthy school initiatives. Mr. Best attended Back to School Night to share information with parents about the district’s work to increase physical activity during the day. Specifically, the district began incorporating 15 minutes of physical activity first thing in the morning and 10 minutes in the afternoon, outside of recess and PE (Read our story about the Healthy Minds, Healthy Bodies program here). The parents’ responses were overwhelming:

“Not one parent was saying, ‘Hey, why are you trying to make my kid healthier?’ They were asking, ‘Why hasn’t this been done before? What took you so long?’”

Engage parents as champions. Mr. Best observed, “Once we have the push from the parents, that helps ‘turn the battleship.’ It tells the principals and administrators that [their] stakeholders want [more physical activity in schools].”