About the Project

William H. Rice Elementary School in Santa Maria, CA is a large school in a low socio-economic community. We host just over 1000 students each day, feeding them free breakfast, a healthy snack, lunch, and for many, dinner. Being a low socio-economic community, we operate through various obstacles to ensure the safety and education of our students. Our parents are hard workers who often fall behind on keeping up with the overall health of themselves and their families. Many others do not know of the services that are available. At Rice Elementary, we have had the privilege of working closely with our students to create a Wellness program which encompasses many elements within our school community. As our Physical Education program has the privilege of reaching all students in grades 1-6, we began to see the importance of not only having a PE class, but creating an environment of overall wellness throughout our school campus and beyond, into their homes. Through this process, we have created an Ambassador program which is operated by a group of 6th graders, we have our sports teams (grades 3-6), our after school PE programs (grades 1-6), and our Family Wellness Night (whole school and families).