Marin County Safe Routes to Schools
Team Leader Newsletter
October 2004

Team Leader Roster attached

TEAM LEADER UPDATES

1. Another Great Walk to School Day
2. Walk and Bike Across America Now On-line
3. Sign up for Frequent Rider Miles
4. SchoolPool update
5. Rainy Days
6. Featured School - Dixie

TEAM LEADER UPDATES

1. Another Great Walk to School Day

Congratulations to everyone on another great International Walk to School Day. We had thirty four schools participating, although some schools held their events on different days because of parochial holidays and field trips. Here are just a few highlights:

From Lu Sutton in Novato:
"LuSutton was AWESOME today. This event turned out better than I had hoped for. All the kids had a great time walking with their friends and the parents had fun too. We had two staging area's set-up, one which was hosted by Curtis Aikens our celebrity chef from Calling All Cooks. You should have seen the walking school buses coming from both these area's. The kids were carrying signs and balloons and were very excited when they got to school. Some parents said, "This was fun, we should do this more often". The crossing guards were great and had fun out there too. I had two Dad's (one happened to be my husband) that are requesting to work closer to the school next time because they had so much fun and wanted to be where all the action was. They made their crosswalk the one to go through, by dancing around and pretending to play guitar with the stop signs!

"We had a great welcoming table setup with juice & muffins. Some of the teachers, staff and principal, Ken Gallegos were in the front of the school to greet & cheer the kids. The kids were greeted with a treat baggie (zipper pull, pencil, mini notepad & tootsie pop) as a thank you for walking or biking to school. Speaking of biking, we had alot more kids biking to school on this day. The bike rack was the fullest I had ever seen it."

From Lynwood in Novato:
Everything went incredibly well! We had a great turn out, A 2nd grade teacher said 17 of her 18 students walked or rode to school today. It helped to have a great bike and helmet for a raffle prize (donated by the Fremantle family and Novato Dental), and Laurie Smith and Kaiser donated four pedometers as well for additional prizes. The kids loved it and we will do it again next year !

Mt. Tam in Mill Valley:
We had 95% participation on a walk down the hill. Three classes had 100% participation.

Pleasant Valley in Novato:
"The morning went great! We had a really large turn out of walkers, rollers, and carpools. The kids were greeted at the surrounding cross streets of the school and walked in by the school principal, school secretary, librarian and PE teachers. As always we had the support of the NPD. The kids had a great time!"

Tam Valley in Mill Valley:
"We had nearly 200 sign ins and very few-handful of cars in lot. Marin ave was like a "ghost town" and I am trying to institute a no drive time zone for kids 7:30-8:30 am. We launched it Wednesday and it was respected and adhered by the neighbors! Yeah!"

Wade Thomas in San Anselmo:
"Wade Thomas had a walk parade from Creek Park in San Anselmo down San Anselmo Ave to Ross Ave. and School. The San Anselmo Police Dept. escorted us."

Reed in Tiburon:
"There were three meeting points for children to walk to relevant school: Boardwalk, Cove and Blackie's Pasture. We encouraged more walkers this year, especially the younger children to walk from Boardwalk with parents into Reed School. The children received rewards on arrival at school - stickers, safety information and a treat. We tied in with 'SchoolPool'. There are three $200 prizes of cycling equipment to be won. Anyone who signed up for Schoolpool has a chance to win and the drawing was held at Reed School that morning. There were celebratory balloons along routes - kindly co-ordinated by Del Mar school council and -Safety Art - banners and posters made by the children."

Bahia Vista in San Rafael:
"We had an awesome W2SD 2004!! Thanks for all of your help. We wound up buying plain green balloons (BV's Colors are green and white) to hand out The morning went beautifully, nonetheless. SRPD was there to escort us. We had at least three times as many walkers, who paraded from Pickleweed to the school, as last year, and many parents helped and walked with their kids. All participants got a sticker, a jacket pull, a bottle of water, apple slices and pan dulce at the school when they arrived. Many kids got balloons and their handmade signs to carry in the parade. Everyone had a fun."

Sun Valley in San Rafael:
There was a pedestrian parade from Sun Valley Market starting at 8 am and a Bike Parade from Summit bicycles, who provided free bike fix ups.

We'll be putting up pictures on the web site next week.

2. Walk and Bike Across America Now On-line

Walk and Bike Across America is now on-line and we have maps available. You can go to www.saferoutestoschools.org/walk to view the site. You can test drive the site by logging on as a student Pick 'Best Class!' from the pull down menu. Then type in: secret word: "the best." You can now view some of the websites along the route. We will be fine-tuning the site based on your feedback so let us know what you think. To get into the teacher view to see more of how the map works, contact wendi@marinbike.org and I will give you further instructions. If you know of teachers at your school that might be likely candidates for using this program , please contact Melanie@marinbike.org.

Bright Idea: Neil Cummins is doing a whole school activity. Every Wednesday, during their regular Walk and Roll to School day, the students get tickets for walking, biking, bus and carpool. Each one counts as one mile. They put their tickets into the place they want to go on the map and that counts as their vote. The map is posted in the library for everyone to see.

3. Sign up for Frequent Rider Miles

Please sign up for Frequent Rider Miles this spring. For those of you new to the program, Frequent Rider Miles is our yearly spring contest. Children get tally cards to keep track of the number of times they walk, bike, carpool or take the bus to and from school. They get a point for each time and every 20 points they get an instant reward and get entered into a raffle to win a gift certificate for a new trek bicycle and other valuable prizes. In order to get our prizes in a timely manner, we need to inform Trek of the number of participating schools. Please let us know by Thanksgiving if you will be doing the contest this year. If you want more information you can go to our website at www.saferoutestoschools.org and look under contests and events. You can also call Melanie at 456-3469 ext. 5# if you have questions.

4. School Pool Update

We now have twenty schools signed up for SchoolPool although not every schools has worked out the verification process with RIDES. Contact Jackie Stiasny to work this out jstiasny@rides.org. You must do this to fully activate your account. We can also assist you in developing a send home to your parents to promote SchoolPool. The best results so far have come from the Reed School District. Reed District put a box on their emergency cards to invite parents to participate in School Pool. They received 350 sign ups as a result of this small effort. While it is too late for other schools to follow their lead this year, we strongly recommend that you promote the same technique in your school next year. For more information contact Wendi at 488-4101 or wendi@marinbike.org.

5. Rainy Days

The first storms of the year have arrived and by now, many walkers and bikers have retreated to their cars again. Don't let this discourage you. Remember that our Marin weather comes and goes and that as soon as the sunshine peeps through the clouds, many of these children will be back on their feet again. Continue with your Walk and Roll to School Days if you have weekly events, and expect that your turnout will go down. As long as you keep the momentum alive, people will come back into the fold.

Use your school newsletter to encourage parents to dress their children warm, and make sure that they have their rain gear with them. In one school in British Columbia (where it rains a lot), they had their Walk to School Day logo printed on umbrellas and passed them out to students. In Seattle (another soggy place), adult students from the university formed Rainy Day clubs with catchy names like Soggy Bottoms. Kids love to be out in the rain and as long as they are dressed properly and it is not storming out, they will be fine. You may also want to ask your principal to set aside a special spot for students to leave their wet clothes and change. Remember, when we were young we walked ten miles to school in the snow and sleet.

6. Featured School - Dixie

Dixie Bike Safety Day

Dixie's whole school celebrated biking and safety on the beautiful fall day of September 24th. The morning was started with Yikes and her crew of performers, teaching students how to have fun and be safe. Little did the students know that Yike's friend the BMX rider AKA Chris Duncan would be performing again during lunch. The kids were entertained on their blacktop by Chris showing crazy tricks from a 20 foot ramp he had set up at their school.

Safe Routes to Schools was there to balance out the fun stunts of trick riders with a day of bike rodeos. Over 192 students participated. Safe Routes staff could not have asked for more enthusiastic youth and volunteers. Refreshments were provided for all staff and over 15 volunteers showed up to help along with 3 members of the Highway Safety Patrol. Next year, Kel Harris, team leader says he will shoot for 100% participation. Go Dixie!

For more information please contact Wendi Kallins, Safe Routes to Schools Program Director at (415) 488-4101 or wendi@marinbike.org

Safe Routes to Schools is a program funded by the Bay Area Air Quality Management District and administered by the County of Marin on behalf of the Marin County Congestion Management Agency and the County, Cities and Towns of Marin.