A flood of kids spilled out of a school bus that stopped near the Witch’s Hat water tower in Minneapolis’ Prospect Park neighborhood.
“We get to walk?” one student asked excitedly, bounding off the bus.
D.Jay Gjerde, who coordinates Pratt Elementary’s Walk to School Day, offered high-fives and corralled the kids to walk the last few blocks to the school.
“They light up when they realize they’re not going straight to the school,” Gjerde said.
Getting to class on foot is a novelty for most students these days. But many Minnesota schools are pushing more kids to walk or bike, in hopes of introducing physical activity, easing pressure on transportation budgets and reducing congestion in drop-off zones.
Cities and schools have spent tens of millions of dollars through federal and state grants to add sidewalks, install flashing lights at crosswalks and set up chaperoned “walking school bus” routes to address unsafe roads, which parents cite over and over as their main concern for walking kids.
“A lot of people assume it’s, ‘Oh, it takes too long,’ ‘We live too far,’ or ‘Minnesota is cold,‘” said Kelly Corbin, the Minnesota Department of Transportation’s Safe Routes to School coordinator. “The big concerns are actually our built environment, our infrastructure that we have, that is a determining factor for students wanting to walk and parents or caregivers allowing them to walk.”
Older generations like to joke they walked to school, uphill both ways. The walking part, at least, is mostly true.
Factors go beyond demographic changes, too. Many school districts offer magnet programs that attract students from a larger area, and Minnesota’s open enrollment system means many kids attend schools miles from home. Plus, families are busy, and worry about crime and dangerous drivers not paying attention to kids on foot.
On Walk to School Day at Pratt Elementary in Minneapolis, buses stop a few blocks from the school and the students walk the rest of the way. (Leila Navidi/The Minnesota Star Tribune)
Walking benefits kids and districts
Congress in 2005 created the national Safe Routes to School program, which supports infrastructure and education programs aimed at getting more kids walking. Since then, Minnesota’s Safe Routes to School program has funneled more than $66 million to districts and local governments across the state to pay for education and physical improvements.
In 2023, the Legislature passed a law requiring Minnesota schools to teach kindergarten through eighth graders about walking and biking to school at the beginning of each school year.
Walking has benefits for kids, Corbin said. Whether they get to school that way or take a lap around the building before classes begin, getting morning exercise helps activate kids’ brains.
“When they get to their classroom, they’re awake, they got their wiggles out, they chatted with their friends, and they’re ready to tune into their teachers,” she said.
It also reduces congestion around schools, helps kids build independence and alleviates pressure on parents to drive. And while not all kids can get to school that way, learning how to walk and bike safely helps when they walk to a friend’s house or a store, Corbin said.
