winooski School District

Winooski School District didn't just hold a wellness day, they EMBODIED and championed the definition of the word.

Starting with a healthy breakfast in the cafeteria, 176 participants then gathered in the auditorium for a program produced by Wellness champion Patrice Lumumba. At the heart of the program was the importance of unity and emotional support for the whole school community. The idea has been to recreate and recharge as a team in order to power through the rest of the year with excellence.

After the assembly, there were no less than 40 different activities to choose from, including drumming, making tomato sauce, playing cribbage, basketball, soccer, zumba and coloring. It was a day of learning, moving, fun, and games, enjoying time with fellow staff. Everyone interviewed said it is always their "favorite day of the year."

PATH Wellness Champion Patrice Lumumba couldn't have been happier with the day. During the assembly, he challenged everyone to walk around and speak to three different people they didn't know. They were encouraged to share who they were, a fun fact about themselves, and what they do in the school district. The goal, Lumumba said, was to foster inclusivity and ensure that everyone feels valued and heard.

Jaycie Puttlitz, a PATH rockstar and middle/high school health educator, has participated in and helped organize the Wellness Day for 10 years. "The key thing is that we are here just having fun together, connecting with each other. We don't get that during our school day. We're so focused on connecting with our students that we forget we are colleagues and we are in this together. We need to support each other and be there for each other. This is a way for us to build that rapport and those relationships with each other."

When asked what wellness means to him, instructional assistant, Jack Wild, answered, "To me, wellness means making sure to take care of not just your physical needs and necessities, but also your mental wellbeing and spiritual fulfillment. The three of them kind of exist in an equilibrium in my mind, so that you can't really have one without the others. It would be like having one healthy branch on a tree. That's not the whole tree. You need to make sure that the whole thing is take care of."

To be sure, there is a forest of healthy trees growing in the Winooski School district!