School kids must fit in 30 minutes of exercise
Kate Webb, The Province
Published: Wednesday, September 05, 2007

Children will be required to do 30 minutes of exercise a day come next September, Education Minister Shirley Bond announced yesterday.

Students will be able to sweat out their mandatory minutes either during or outside of school hours, said Bond, so walking to school, sports, and classroom calisthenics will all be on the list of acceptable activities.

"This is not about mandatory PE, this is about daily physical activity," said Bond after making the first-day-of-school announcement at Waverley Elementary in Vancouver.

"This is not adding to a student's curricular course load, but in fact [high-school students] already are required to do 80 minutes of physical activity [per week] to graduate. We are going to increase that to 150 [minutes for all students]."

Bond said her ministry will figure out details, such as how activity levels will be monitored, in the next year.

But come next fall, she said, schools will have to offer at least 30 minutes of physical activity programming each day, whether during class or recess.

Bond also said the government will make good on its two-year-old promise to remove junk food from schools by 2009, a year early. The ban will be implemented in elementary schools in January, and in middle and secondary schools next September.

Students at Waverley seemed to like the idea of enforced exercise, although they may have been swayed by the fitness swag lavished on them by the province's ActNow BC Leadership Council. Each student who participated in a classroom calisthenics demonstration received a lunch bag with a healthy lunch packed inside, and a free pedometer.

"I've been doing 30 minutes [of exercise] a day already outside of school," said 10-year-old Maggie Montano, who started Grade 5 yesterday and participated in the demonstration.

"We play, run, do sports. But it's better to do it with your classmates and friends, because you can have more activities on your list and do more [team] sports, 'cause you need a lot of players."

Statistics Canada says one in four B.C. children is obese or overweight.

Health Canada recommends kids do at least 30 minutes of moderate to vigorous physical exercise a day, anything from brisk walking, skating and bike riding to running or weight training. kwebb@png.canwest.com

© The Vancouver Province 2007