Building a healthier community with the Blue Zones Project
On Saturday, April 1, I invite you to attend a free event celebrating health and wellness— and the ribbon cutting for our all-weather track! It's open to all community members and it showcases Konocti Unified School District's partnership with Blue Zones Project Lake County. Join us between 10 am and 2 pm at the Lower Lake High School football field for cooking demonstrations, live music, activities for kids, and educational resources from local organizations.
The Blue Zones Project is a worldwide movement that encourages small but lasting changes that build healthier communities, from creating walkable communities to making healthy food easier to find and afford.
The principles of the Blue Zones Project are based on the habits and lifestyles of people from the healthiest areas of the world, where living to the age of 100 is not uncommon. While eating well and exercising are big themes of the Blue Zones Project, being truly healthy means considering mental and emotional health, too. The Blue Zones Project takes complete wellness into account—not just physical health.
Since arriving at Konocti Unified, I've seen the significant challenges our students face, from substance abuse to poverty and neglect. I've also seen incredible examples of resilience, where students overcome barriers that seemed insurmountable. As educators, we see the obstacles and we know we have work to do for all of our students to thrive, but we are dedicated to doing that work. You may have heard me say, “We're getting better at getting better.”
Part of this effort includes providing information and resources so students and families know how to make healthier choices, as we are doing through our Facebook wellness campaign. Another part of this work is our partnership with Blue Zones Project Lake County, using Blue Zones criteria to create school environments that nurture students' minds and bodies.
As we work to officially become a Blue Zones Project-approved district, we're offering healthier food options in our cafeterias and encouraging everyone to take regular walks and exercise. We're also working on ways to help students maintain a positive outlook, find passion and purpose, and consistently connect with others in a meaningful way. After COVID, this has never been more important. Students have had to re-learn how to get along with each other in person.
But this is just the beginning. For this to really take hold, we all need to work in partnership: schools, families, and community members. By embracing these ideas and supporting changes that may seem small at first, we can have a dramatic impact on our students' (and everyone's) health and wellbeing. For example, a simple change from a RedBull Infusion to a fruit smoothie for breakfast can change a student's outlook for the day.
We know we can teach the Blue Zones principles in the classroom until we're blue in the face, but unless those lessons are reinforced outside of school, they're not likely to stick. Plus, much of the success of the Blue Zones Project is based on community participation. The more people who get involved, the greater the impact, and the more we all benefit. And those benefits are incredible: decreased health care costs, longer lives, more complete wellness, and economic prosperity for our community.
If you're excited about the potential impacts of the Blue Zones Project, I really hope you will join us on April 1 for the Blue Zones event. Blue
Zones Project co-founder Nick Buettner will start the day off with an inspiring speech in the new gym at 10 am. We'll do a ribbon-cutting ceremony for the all-weather track at 10:30 am. And then it's just a bunch of fun for everyone, with musicians, a petting zoo, play areas for kids, food from Blue Zones cookbooks, Zumba classes, and a raffle. Many of our students will be running booths and local community-based organizations will provide plenty of resources and information to help you engage with the Blue Zones principles.
At KUSD, we approach every day as an opportunity to make our community happier, healthier, safer, and more resilient. Partnering with the Blue Zones Project is an important step in achieving these goals. We hope you'll join us—both at the event and in embracing our larger mission to make our community an even better place to live.