Presidential honor

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Fifth-grader Enrique Flores dribbles the ball down field as part of a micro soccer tournament during physical education class at Hiawatha Elementary School on Wednesday. (Beck Diefenbach – bdiefenbach@daily-chronicle.com)

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KIRKLAND – It is an honor more than two decades in the making.

That’s how long students at Hiawatha Elementary School have taken part in the President’s Council on Physical Fitness and Sports, a program aimed at helping the nation’s children stay fit. Students can take the Physical Fitness Test annually. Students are individually declared winners of the president’s fitness award, and schools with the highest percentage of students who meet program standards can be named state champions.

And that’s what has happened for Hiawatha Elementary, which was named the 2009 Illinois State Champion by the President’s Council for state schools with enrollments of 201-500 students.

Principal Faye Lynch said the honor was not unexpected, and gave physical education teacher David Cox the credit for the school winning.

“Every day he’s so enthusiastic,” Lynch said.

For 2009, St. Mary Nativity School in Joliet was named the Category 1 state champion, which includes schools with 50-200 students. There was no Category 3 winner, which includes schools with more than 500 students.

The program’s Web site has state champion winners back to the 1995-1996 academic year, and no other DeKalb County school was listed as a recipient in any category during that time.

The national fitness program began in 1956 as a national fitness testing program, according to the program’s Web site. The annual awards were created in 1966.

Students are tested in five events: pull-ups, sit-ups, mile run, sit and reach, and a sprint, Cox said. Expectations increase every year: A 6-year-old boy, for instance, needs to run a mile in 10 minutes, 15 seconds to qualify, while a 17-year-old boy needs to run it in 6 minutes, 6 seconds.

Fifth-graders Madeline Dashney and Adam Spear, both 11, have both won the award for three years.

“It’s not something easy to get. It’s hard,” Spear said during a break from a soccer game Wednesday morning.

“It’s important to stay fit,” Dashney added. “If you’re not staying healthy, it’s hard to do things. I felt sort of proud winning the award. A lot of people can’t do it.”

This year, about 41 percent of Hiawatha Elementary students – or 84 out of 206 – met the standards. The first year the school participated, just eight qualified, Cox said. There are many benefits to keeping fit, Cox said, including better health and higher self-esteem.

“It’s very important because it develops a positive attitude toward fitness,” he said of the program. “In this school, it’s cool to be fit.”

Students have a daily 30-minute physical education class, which can include anything from the soccer students were playing Wednesday to the circuit training that starts later this week. While all students may not join an athletic team, he said he wants all of them to have an appreciation for sports.

“As their teacher I can light a fire under them about getting excited about being fit. At some point, they have to carry it over on their own,” he said. “... I see them around town. They aren’t sitting on a bean bag eating chips and flipping channels. They are out being active.”

The school’s efforts to teach students to be healthy goes beyond gym class, Lynch said. French fries aren’t served in the lunchroom anymore, and they aim to bake instead of fry food items while also increasing the fruits and vegetables served, Lynch said. Nutritional information is scattered throughout the elementary curriculum.

The school hopes to get a blue banner celebrating the honor in its gymnasium within a week, Cox said. The bottom has the year 2009 in gold but also a lot of empty space.

Because that’s where Cox said he plans to add more years the school is named state champions.

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