HOST Welcomes Back-to-School Time

It's back-to-school time, and HOST members are ready with tips, advice, and examples of how to make time out of school, as well as in it, full of healthy eating and physical activity.

• First, don't forget to read and share the National AfterSchool Association Healthy Eating and Physical Activity Standards, developed by the HOST Coalition to make sure your schools and your children's schools are on track with wellness for all.
• The Pew Charitable Trusts offer a collection of "Back to School Tools: Healthy Food Tips, Facts, and Resources."
• Recess can help teach positive social skills, writes Playworks' Director of Communications, Mindy Maschmeyer. Playworks has developed a series of key questions to assess the quality of recess at elementary schools, and invites parents to see how their children's schools measure up.
• Most U.S. schools are offering whole grains, more fruits and vegetables, and reducing sodium content to help meet federal school meal standards, according to data in the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's (CDC) Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report. The report notes that students consume almost half of their daily calories at school.
• The Los Angeles Unified School District's' “breakfast in the classroom” program, the largest in the nation, completes its three-year rollout this month, reports No Kid Hungry.
• The USDA reports on the impact of the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act, which set better nutrition standards for schools, and urges its reauthorization.