March 29, 2024

Berg Middle School in second round of healthiest mascot contest

BMS could win $1,000 for a health or fitness project

Berg Middle School is going toe-to-toe with Algona Middle School this week — though there are fields, courts or courses involved.

Berg is in the midst of a contest with Iowa Healthiest State Initiative with $1,000 as the prize on the nonprofit’s Facebook page. With the aim of encouraging Iowa schools to fundraise for a health or fitness project, the contest encourages supporters of each of the first 32 schools who submitted applications to vote for their school in a bracket matchup format.

The school with the most votes moves on to the next round.

Berg narrowly eclipsed the 2015 champion, Brody Middle School of Des Moines, in last week’s first round, 301 votes to 292. In second-round voting, which ends Sunday, Berg faces Algona Middle School. The final eight will match up next week, and the matchups continue until the $1,000 champion is crowned.

Sarah Reichhardt of Healthiest State Initiative said in last years finals, Brody needed more than 800 votes to win.

“We get a lot of traction out of this contest,” Reichardt said. “It’s a great way for the school to give something back to the community in encouraging health and fitness.”

The Healthiest State Initiative started in Iowa in 2010 with a goal of making Iowa the healthiest state by 2016. When it started, Iowa ranked as the 19th healthiest state in the nation by the Gallup-Healthways Well-Being Index, and has since made it into the top 10.

There are also a hundreds of Healthiest Iowa Walks slated for Oct. 5, with Berg hosting one of the nine walks within Jasper County. The “BMS Step It Up!” is slated for 2:15 p.m. that day. Students and staff walk for 30 minutes together on a fall fitness walk, enjoying the outdoors and improving on healthy habits of walking.

The Berg coordinator for these events is P.E. teacher Ashley Ryan.

“For the past four years, I have signed Berg Middle School up for the Healthiest State Initiative walk,” Ryan said. “This year, when I signed us up we happened to be one of the first schools to sign up.”

Reichardt said there isn’t a mandate or a plan submission requirement in order to claim the prize. However, schools are strongly encouraged to have fitness or wellness plan ready in case it wins the $1,000 prize.

“To be honest, we haven’t really set a specific thing we we would us the money for,” Ryan said. “However, we are really keying in on lifetime fitness for our students. We are looking into new equipment that would empower students to make choices, meet challenges and develop positive behaviors in fitness, wellness and movement activity for a lifetime.”

A search for the Facebook page “Healthiest State Initiative Iowa” should reveal the page’s location. A tab called “Mascot Challenge” on that page will then take voters to the voting page.

Ryan encourages Berg students and parents and all Newton residents to vote for Berg in the contest. She also hopes students catch the point of the contest — that fitness and nutrition have lifetime benefits.

“We want to improve the recreational quality of our student’s lives,” Ryan said. “We are always looking at new ways to provide ground work for our students to have an active lifestyle — beyond middle school and into the future.”

Contact Jason W. Brooks at 641-792-3121 ext. 6532 or jbrooks@newtondailynews.com