HURON — A focus on eating right and staying active helped students from Huron and Woonsocket net a trip to an NFL Vikings game — including a pass to be on the field while players warmed up.
The Fuel Up to Play 60 program, sponsored by the National Dairy Council and NFL, is the nation’s largest in-school health and wellness program. The goal is to help encourage youth to lead healthier lives through proper nutrition and physical activity.
Washington School fourth- graders and Woonsocket School seventh-graders were among five grand prize winners chosen in a five-state area. Competing teams created a three-to-five-minute video showing how their school incorporates nutrition and activity in its daily curriculum.
Those attending include Washington fourth-graders Jack Bales, Hannah Schoenfelder and Jonathan Petersen and school nurse/adviser Rita Baszler; and Woonsocket seventh-graders Camden Jost, Hannah Terkildsen and Bailey Feistner, and their adviser, physical education teacher Armondo Rodrieguez.
Each student and adviser was given two passes to the game, one for them and one for a friend, along with the field passes and a $40 gift card for purchases.
“Me and Jack have a friend with prosthetic legs and he’s really active,” Petersen said. “We put him on the video to show that even with a disability you can be active.”
The Fuel Up to Play 60 program was launched as part of the “Let’s Move!” initiative to reverse the growing trend of childhood obesity and inactivity.

Rodriguez said they have been involved in the program for six years.
“We have a good Boost Up program that our elementary does, we got that from the Huron schools,” he said. “We also started a walking club, where every morning twice a week, we walk around the lake,” Rodriguez said. “In our video, our seventh-grade kids made recipes for eating kale and spinach that would taste good and be attractive to kids.
“The biggest thing for our kids and school is thinking of eating healthy and exercise outside of the school and PE environment,” he added. “My goal was to have them thinking about their health outside of that environment.”
The Fuel Up to Play 60 program, which is active in more than 20,000 schools, also offers funding opportunities to schools to improve healthy eating and physical activity throughout the community.
“We’ve received grants to do the Rainbow Run, to improve the cafeteria and start a walking program at Madison School,” Baszler said. “It keeps kids involved in learning, and they learn they need to eat right and exercise to feel good.”
Studies show that staying active contributes to higher test scores, improved attendance, better behavior in class and healthy habits.
“One of the programs that came from Fuel Up to Play 60 are brain breaks,” Baszler said. “We do it as a school once a day at Washington.”
Brain breaks are like a mini-recess, when kids get up and move next to their desks.
Huron schools have been involved in the Fuel Up program for the past six years, and this is the second trip to a Vikings game for Baszler, who added: “Actually, I’m a Steeler’s fan.”

Photos:

Washington 4-5 Center fourth-graders, from left, Jonathan Petersen, Hannah Schoenfelder and Jack Bales, pose on the field prior to the NFL Vikings game on Sept. 24, with Lucas Lentsch, CEO of the Midwest Dairy Association; and in back, Emily Annexstad, 2017 Princess Kay of the Milky Way from St. Peter, Minn., and Rita Baszler, Washington 4-5 Center nurse.

Next, Woonsocket School’s Fuel Up to Play 60 winners shown on the field prior to the NFL Vikings game include, from left, Bailey Feistner, Hannah Terkildsen, PE instructor Armondo Rodriguez and Camden Jost.

Courtesy Photos