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Learning Better School Bus Safety

National School Bus Safety Week is October 21–25 and provides an important opportunity to address and promote the importance of school bus safety while also educating on better safety practices.

As the direct link between home and school, school bus transportation plays a critical role in the education of our nation’s students. More than 25 million children ride the bus every school day, and National School Bus Safety Week serves as a reminder for students, parents, teachers, and their community to keep school bus safety top of mind. Following are some helpful tips from the National Association for Pupil Transportation (NAPT) to keep children safer at the bus stop:

  • Encourage children to wear bright, contrasting colors so they’re more visible to drivers.
     
  • Make sure children arrive at the bus stop before it is due, ideally at least five minutes early. Teach children the dangers of running after or in front of a bus.
     
  • There’s safety in numbers — walk young children to the bus stop or encourage kids to walk in groups (which are easier for drivers to see).
     
  • Practice good pedestrian behavior — walk on the sidewalk, and stay out of the street.
     
  • If you do have to walk in the street, walk single file, face traffic and stay as close to the edge of the road as possible.
     
  • At the Bus Stop, have children wait in a location where the driver can see them clearly as they come down the street.
     
  • Do not let children play in the street.
     
  • Warn children that if they drop something getting on or off the bus, they should never pick it up. Instead, they should notify the driver and follow the driver’s instructions.
     
  • Remind children to look to the right before they step off the bus.
     
  • If you meet your child at the bus stop after school, wait on the side of the road where the child will be dropped off, not across the street. Otherwise, children can be so excited to see you after school that they dash across the street, forgetting safety rules, and endangering themselves.

For more information, visit https://www.napt.org/nsbsw.

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National School Lunch Week Celebrates the Difference a Simple Lunch Can Make

The National School Lunch Program (NSLP) serves nearly 30 million children every school day, providing the essential basic nutrition that contributes to student success and teacher support. President John F. Kennedy created National School Lunch Week (NSLW) in 1962 to promote the importance of a healthy school lunch in a child’s life, as well as the impact a simple school lunch can have both inside and outside the classroom.

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September is Suicide Prevention Awareness Month

September is Suicide Prevention Awareness Month, offering an ideal opportunity to speak out and raise awareness on this vital topic — an awareness that is urgently required, with suicide the tenth leading cause of death among adults in the U.S. — and the second leading cause of death among children and young people aged 10–24. Unfortunately, these rates are increasing, and those who are young, LGBTQ, or BIPOC are especially vulnerable. LGBTQ youth are four times more likely to attempt suicide, while transgender adults, meanwhile, are almost 12 times more likely than the general population to attempt suicide.

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Memorializing the Horrors of the Transatlantic Slave Trade, on Slavery Remembrance Day

Created by UNESCO to memorialize the horrors of the transatlantic slave trade, Slavery Remembrance Day, also known as International Day for the Remembrance of the Slave Trade and its Abolition, is observed on August 23 worldwide. Upon this day, it's important that we remember that this observance is not only a reminder of the horrors of slavery as we honor its victims—it's also about our dedication across the globe to ensure that slavery, and the racism that caused it, is abolished once and for all.

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Promoting Indigenous Rights on the International Day of the World's Indigenous People

Commemorating the historic meeting of the first United Nations Working Group on Indigenous Populations in 1982, International Day of the World’s Indigenous People (August 9) provides us with the chance to promote the rights of Indigenous People worldwide, while also amplifying their voices, cultures, and accomplishments. In these days of increased concern over climate change, the knowledge and commitment of many indigenous peoples to sustainability and biodiversity may in fact prove crucial to protecting the earth for future generations.

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Looking to the Stars on Women Astronomers Day

Far too often, the history books seem to focus on the men who made the impacts, the men who made the achievements—and then men who looked to the stars. Yet throughout history, the eyes of women have focused on the stars as intensively as men, and to them belong many great achievements and discoveries as they played essential roles in a variety of scientific and astronomical breakthroughs.

Which is why, every August 1, we celebrate Women Astronomers Day.

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