NFL Blitzes Childhood Obesity at Pro Bowl..By Cindy Mercer
Following morning practices on January 28th NFL Pro Bowl players, coaches and Bank of America community volunteers will spend the afternoon working to improve the South Florida community as part of the first-ever “NFL PLAY 60 Community Blitz” in celebration of the Pro Bowl. This initiative will be the largest community program in the league’s history!
During the Community Blitz, launched in partnership with NFL PLAYERS and league sponsor Bank of America, Pro Bowl players and more than 150 Bank of America employees will take part in three service projects in Broward, Miami-Dade, and Palm Beach Counties. The projects are each designed to help local children stay healthy and active as part of NFL PLAY 60, the league’s campaign to fight childhood obesity. Since the program was launched in 2007, the NFL has committed $200 million to youth health and fitness through programming, grants, and media time for PSAs. Bank of America will also donate $100,000 to PLAY 60 non-profit community partners as part of the program.
The Broward County event will take place at RISE Academy School of Science and Technology, a free public charter elementary school. Players will be joined by NFL Commissioner ROGER GOODELL and NFLPA Executive Director DEMAURICE SMITH and will work with non-profit organization KaBOOM!, RISE students, Bank of America associates and other community volunteers will construct a customized playground at the school, which is currently without a gym or play area.
In Miami-Dade County, players will gather at the NFL Youth Education Town to host an NFL PLAY 60 Football Festival and healthy cooking demonstration. Together, the group will lead local children in football and fitness drills, and host a healthy cooking demonstration with FLIPANY, a community group that provides affordable physical activity and nutrition programs for local youth. This site will also include a “Super Kids-Super Sharing” sports equipment drive, as part of the league’s environmental initiatives around the Super Bowl and Pro Bowl. In addition, Bank of America will fund a healthy meal pack assembly for school children to benefit the Daily Bread Food Bank.
A third group of players will volunteer in Palm Beach County with NFL Network analyst JAMIE DUKES. They will work with non-profit organization Boundless Playgrounds to build an adaptive play-space for physically challenged students at Boca Raton Community Middle School. Throughout the year, students at the school have participated in the NFL PLAY 60 Challenge, an in-school program designed by the American Heart Association to help children stay physically active for 60 minutes a day.
According to the Alliance for a Healthier Generation 17.1% of children in the United States Ages 2-19 are overweight. Childhood obesity is particularly troubling because those extra pounds often start kids on the path to health problems that were once confined to adults, such as diabetes, high blood pressure, high cholesterol and heart disease. One of the best strategies to combat excess weight in children is to improve their diet and exercise levels. As we all know children are influenced by their favorite athlete; this fact makes the NFL and NFL Players commitment to fight childhood obesity so important. This initiative will foster life long and life saving changes for children!
The 2010 Pro Bowl will be played on Sunday, January 31 and televised live on ESPN at 7:20 PM ET from Dolphin Stadium in South Florida.
For more information:
NFL Play 60: www.NFLRUSH.com/play60
NFL Players: NFLPLAYERS.COM
Alliance Healthier Generation: http://www.healthiergeneration.org/schools.aspx
ACES: http://www.aces.edu/dept/extcomm/newspaper/mar19a01.html
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Impressive post. My family and I were just talking about this the other evening. Also your post looks nice on my old laptop. Now thats uncommon. Nice work.
Thank you!….cindy
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This post was mentioned on Twitter by TrinitySportsNY: My latest article for @Blksportsonline: “NFL Blitzs’ Childhood Obesity” http://bit.ly/7XwgZS ……cindy…
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What industry is paying for the Activity Only Solution? I am working to fight childhood obesity using Education ,Advocacy,Dignity ,Integrity and Hope. No industry has offered to get involved and my message is not about weight loss. We need to start looking into our food environment and any effort needs to be clear and transparent.
Lets build a community obesity action plan.
http://obesitythunderbay.ning.com/profiles/blogs/…
Thanks for the sharing! Your article truly assisted me.
Obesity is really an epidemic these days. People have become very lazy and does not want to exercise anymore. I do a lot of jogging and brisk walking everyday just to be fit and healthy.
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Obesity and diabetes are becoming more and more of a problem these days. Actually it is easy to avoid being overweight by just having the proper diet and exercise.
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