*health. moves. minds.® is a fundraising program where 50% of funds raised go back to your school!
Get started with your event by completing this short interest form.
What is health.moves.minds.?
The health. moves. minds.® fundraiser brings together the lessons, activities, and community-building ideas that help students live their best life. Physical Educators hold an event to fundraise for the national SHAPE America Organization, their state SHAPE Organization, and a choice of taking 50% of the funds raised to grow their Physical Education equipment or dividing the 50% and pledging 25% of the funds raised to a local non-profit.
Why did I choose health.moves.minds.?
I teach in a building with banners from 2003 for Jump Rope for Heart. I can remember participating in Jump Rope for Heart as a kid. The history and tradition of Jump Rope for Heart is strong, so I was hesitant to try health.moves.minds, but I set up a meeting with Stephanie Jumps and communicated with my state representative Tom Roberts. After chatting with both of them, it honestly appeared again too good to be true. I felt there had to be a catch with getting 50% of the fundraising efforts back to the school, but I decided to go for it! In the previous year, our school raised over $10,000 through Kids Heart Challenge, while receiving a kickback of $850. I understand that the fundraiser is not only about growing our school’s Physical Education program, but when I realized our school could raise even $5000 and be able to retain $1250 and give $1250 directly to a local non-profit, it was worth trying. With our event we ended up raising $2,870. Our school ended up receiving $717.50 back for our PE program and $717.50 went towards a charity of our choosing.
Where do you go… before, during and after?
The health.moves.minds fundraising HQ website was user friendly. They had email templates to send out to families prior to the event, during the event and after the event. I used those templates as a starting point and edited them to fit our event. For simplicity, I copied the email content and sent it out through our infinite campus message center. When families sign up, they are encouraged to share through social media and email contacts just like Kids Heart Challenge. Donations go directly through the health. moves. minds.® fundraising site, and I received emails as we made progress towards our goal.
Who receives fundraising efforts?
SHAPE America and MNSHAPE are two organizations where our donations went. According to SHAPE America, “SHAPE America provides programs, resources and advocacy that support an inclusive, active and healthier school culture, and the organization’s newest program health. moves. minds. helps teachers and schools incorporate social and emotional learning so students can thrive physically and emotionally.”
State organizations like MNSHAPE further help strengthen all things SHAPE in the state of Minnesota through providing professional development and resources on their website.
The remaining portion of the fundraising efforts goes to your school and the nonprofit of your school’s choice. I decided the best way to increase buy-in for our school would be to include the student council in the decision-making process as well as the advertising efforts. The student council chose the non-profit from the list provided by me. They also decided what would happen to me as a celebration for reaching our goal. As a school, we chose an organization called 360 Communities. This organization is also the group we were holding a canned food drive for during the same 4-week period.
Lastly, GOPHER!!! Your portion of the fundraising efforts come in the form of a GOPHER!!! gift card! No one can match the service GOPHER Sport provides. They are also local for my school, coming from Owatonna, MN.
When did I host my event?
Just like Kids Heart Challenge, you are able to choose when you want to hold the event. I chose to run our event along with our “I Love to Read” month 4-week celebration. Each week focused on a different superhero. As I think about next year, I plan to hold my event separately, during October/November. As much as I want our school to be successful in fundraising efforts for our Physical Education program, I also want us to make a big impact for the non-profit organization. I feel by late February/March, families have been requested to donate to many other fundraisers, so they may turn away.
How did the event go?
After diving into the resources available through the SHAPE America & health.moves.minds site, I decided my theme would be around heroes. As a specialist team, we were already focusing on four character traits that were divided throughout the school year: Kindness, Respect, Responsibility, and Safety. I found some character images available on Canva and gave them names; Captain Kindness, Mr. Responsible, Dr. Safety, and Respectra. I focused on one hero per week over a span of four weeks. The lessons and activities I came up with were found/created after looking through the health.moves.minds resources. Personally, I found the mini lessons easier to blend into my unit without disrupting the students’ learning, as well as, maintaining their interest in class.
Google Slide Presentations
Captain Kid Kindness Doctor Safety Mr. Responsible Respectra
We did not reach our goal this year, so there was no celebration event, but we had a schoolwide assembly ready to occur for me to be taped to the wall. I believe the reason we did not reach our goal was due to the unfamiliarity of health.moves.minds. Now we have a banner hanging on the wall and our top fundraiser has an engraved plaque on the wall outside of the gymnasium. Next year, I am confident the language around health.moves.minds will be better and families will also understand the impact we can have on a local organization within our community.
health. moves. minds. Hero Week!
As a celebration of the work our students did through learning with our Fantastic Four Character Heroes, I held a “HERO WEEK.” I invited every student in every class to invite someone they value greatly to their PE class period. What started off as an idea, quickly became an event that long-time veteran teachers in the building were raving about as the best thing our school has ever done. Since my students receive PE once per week, in total, we had over 360 guests visit from Monday to Friday, in each of the 6 classes per day.
Check out some of the tweets on our health.moves.minds event and HERO WEEK!
Captain Kid Kindness Doctor Safety Mr. Responsible Respectra Hero Week