Walk On! Challenge School Grants

Nearly 27 percent of all children in Arizona are either overweight or obese. These children have an elevated risk for a range of health and emotional problems — now and well into the future.

The Walk On! Challenge is only for the month of February, but kids can use all the help they can get the other 337 (338 in 2020) days of the year. Each qualifying school will have a chance to win one of 10 $2,500 grants for their school from Blue Cross Blue Shield of Arizona.

A panel of community members will use a scoring system to judge the grant submissions. To qualify for a $2,500 grant, teachers must have registered for the current year’s program – for fourth or fifth grade or both – and meet the following criteria:

1. Show an increase in awareness among students of the importance of good nutrition and physical activity along with ways to achieve the 5-2-1-0 goal. The increase will be demonstrated through the pre- and post-Challenge surveys included in the Walk On! Challenge brochure kits.
2. Demonstrate 80 percent student participation in the classroom. One hundred percent participation is defined as every student in the class submitting a tracking sheet with their participation for the month, whether they met the goal each day or not.
3. Submit a brief paragraph of what the teacher plans to do with the $2,500 prize to combat childhood obesity and what it will mean to your school. Discuss which of the 5-2-1-0 goals you plan to impact the most if your school is awarded a grant.

The grant application was open through April 30. Winners will be announced at the end of May.