The School Yard
A school-yard in full flight at recess and lunch time is a fabulous sight to behold.
It’s fast and furious, loud and busy, with various balls and other sporting apparatus being used all over the place. Scenes of children hanging off monkey bars and others running at full pace from one side to the other with friends in hot pursuit abound.
The classroom has more decorum but its still vibrant, industrious, energetic and lively.
School, where children between the ages of 5-18 spend five of their seven-day week is a fun, dynamic and active place. It’s a high-octaine environment directly powered by what goes into these young, growing, and vibrant bodies and minds.
Water Power – why our kids need it?
Food is important, and for many parents it’s what we focus on. Putting good food, full of good energy, into the lunchboxes of our treasured children so that they can do their best each day at school.
But what we are all less mindful about is that water is as important, in fact, often MORE important than food.
Without water a young person quickly becomes dehydrated. Once dehydrated they find it hard to coordinate their body and their young mind finds it hard to concentrate. Their performance falls well below its optimum level and can even lead to decreased immunity and higher chance of sickness.
Water – more often, more important.
Little bodies need to be hydrated with water more often that they do with food, and without it are less likely to be able to concentrate in class or be active and happy in the yard.
We send our children to school with water bottles full of water. If they are one of the lucky ones, this is filled with filtered water from a filtered home tap. But by recess time this initial water supply has been all lapped up and they use water from school bubblers and taps. So the question then is, what’s in the water that they are drinking at school to keep their little brains and bodies working well?
Is this bubbler water hydrating their very best performance?
It’s true to say that any water is probably better than none. But it’s also true to say that this bubbler water is like giving them a candy bar as opposed to a banana. It will get them through but it’s not the best solution.
What’s in unfiltered water?
In South Australia, we entrust water treatment facilities with the responsibility of providing safe drinking water, but they only test and regulate a stipulated number of contaminants.
Some chemicals like chlorine and fluoride are deliberately added to the tap water for specific purposes. Other contaminants that can be found in most unfiltered water are: heavy metals like lead; by-products called trihalomethanes (THMs) that form when the chlorine reacts with organic matter in the water; chromium and arsenic (which is naturally occurring in certain types of rocks and can potentially contaminate groundwater and underground reservoirs) and many types of bacteria including Escherichia Ecoli or Legionella.
All in all it adds up to a pretty toxic cocktail, albeit diluted, and one that is being used to fuel your child’s day. Scary!
The Ripple Effect – The Waterways and Kick Start for Kids initiative
Waterways has joined with KickStart for Kids with the ultimate aim of providing every school in South Australia with clean, clear and sweet tasting filtered water at drinking sources available to children in the school yard. So they can have access to the right kind of water to fuel their days.
Currently Waterways contributes a percentage of every domestic water installation fee that they undertake to the KickStart for Kids Breakfast Program. These funds go towards feeding the children of South Australia breakfast so they can start their day the right way. In addition to helping provide a healthy breakfast, Waterways will be pairing this with the provision of clean, clear and safe sweet tasting water at these schools at their own cost.
It’s a massive and important project and one that Waterways is committed to achieving. Like all projects, it’s going to take time and take place in stages. And Waterways will need the help of each of these school communities.
Stage 1
Stage one is kicking off this month and its called The Ripple Effect. During this stage Waterways is at their own cost aiming to place a Freeflo water filter at each of the schools that is involved with the KickStart for Kids Program, in proximity to where they conduct their breakfast programs.
It is our desire at Waterways, that this water source to be made available too all children of this school at all times of the day to fill and refill their water bottles. This will provide this school community with a constant source of sweet tasting, clean, clear filtered water. Water power!
Stage 2
At the completion of Stage 1, Waterways wish to provide the opportunity to partner with every school, private or public, in South Australia, that is interested in providing clean, clear and sweet tasting water sources to their students as a part of their Ripple Effect initiative. Each school will be treated independently depending on their needs, resources and the best solution determined.
Small ripples end up creating big waves
In having access to clean, clear, sweet tasting water, the school children of South Australia will be super charged. It’s these small, but very important everyday things that add up to creating a brighter moment, a better result, a bigger future.
To find out more, to bring this opportunity to your school community, and to join with Waterways achieve their aim of providing the very best water to power the children of South Australia, get in contact with us today.
Help us start the ripple in your school that will build the wave of healthy change.
Because to us, it’s more than just water, it’s about long term health and well being for your family.
