Campaign history
1995 The very first Walk to School week was in 1995, with just five primary schools taking part in Hertfordshire.1996 The campaign was launched nationally by the Pedestrians Association (later Living Streets) and Travelwise, with the particular support of Dorset and Hertfordshire councils. Originally the Walk to School week was held during Child Safety Week.
1997 Walk to School week moves to its own dedicated week at the end of May. Campaigns begin in Chicago and Los Angeles in the USA.
2000 The first ever International Walk to School Day is launched with schools taking part in Canada, Great Britain, USA, Ireland, Cyprus, Gibralter and the Isle of Man.
2003 International Walk to School day extends into a week of activities. International Walk to School Week was supported by 33 countries including America, Belgium, Canada, Australia and New Zealand.
In London, the Walk to School campaign launches WoW (walk once a week) - a scheme that rewards pupils for walking all year round.
2004
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The 2004 May Walk to School week was launched in Gateshead, Somerset and Harringey. Children in these three schools collected old shoes for recycling and shipment to developing world countries. These same schools then formed pen-pal relationships with three schools in the developing world. During Walk to School Week, the UK children told stories of their walk to school and learnt about walking to school in the developing world.
The shoe recycling was organised by the European Recycling Company (www.europeanrecycling.co.uk)and the pen-pal relationships were made possible by a charity called Link Community Development (www.lcd.org.uk) .
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Red carpet was donated to the campaign from the NEC, Birmingham and the House of Lords.
2005 The 2005 theme was all about health. In May, children took pieces of a Skeleton jigsaw to school, and put it together in the playground. Almost 1.5 million children took part in the May Walk to School week.
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The stunt received national TV coverage across the UK, interviewing the Campaign Coordinator and lots of the children too.
2006 The 2006 theme was about the adventure and independence that pupils can get from walking to schol.
The May Walk to School Week campaign featured 10 giant jigsaws, each telling the story of a childs walk to school. Children took home a piece each, and then put them together in the playground to build the whole story.
In Summer 2006, the campaign unveiled its new mascot. After 10 years, the old brand was looking a little tired, and it was time for Strider, the Walk to School foot, to make his mark.
October 2006 was the first ever International Walk to School Month. The month of activities meant it fitted around school holidays across the globe, as well as giving people time to "develop the walking habit". Over 10 million pupils, across 40 different countries took part.
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This map shows Strider's progress around the country during October on Strider's Big Adventure. The map may take a little while to load.
Open the map of Striders journey in a new window.
You can read all the entries to Strider's diary by clicking here.
2007 In 2007 the Walk to School Week theme was centred on the link between the school run and pollution.
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Woodmansterne Primary School in Lambeth launched this nationwide event in May with a 2 metre wide globe representing the amount of carbon dioxide created by a single car driving to school and back for a week.
This was a great way of portraying the damage a simple car journey can do to the earth!
In 2007 Walk to School week gathered a lot of momentum with lots of attention from the media and hundreds more schools taking part. 81% of local authorities across the nation engaged with Walk to School week meaning thousands of schools accessed our message.
Walk to School Month, which took place in October, continued exploring the link between the school run and the environment. School children were asked to become “Street Rangers”; to take notice of their streets and begin thinking about the sustainability of their journeys.
2008 For Walk to School Week 2008 we asked school children to become “Noise Detectives”.
To mark the launch of Walk to School Week 300 pupils from five different primary schools performed a fantastic concert with instruments made from recycled car parts. The concert was led by pupils from Middle Row Primary School and was attended by seven councilors from the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea. It was an exciting start to an exciting week.
Well over 1 million pupils took on the challenge of becoming “Sound Detectives” and engaged with Walk to School Week 2008. Schools were really creative in how they inspired their pupils to walk to school, for example one school gave out machines that record noise and pupils made a soundtrack of their walk to school!
Today
Every year Walk to School gets bigger and better. Almost two million pupils take part and Walk to School week in May and October are established dates in the school diary.
The WoW scheme is going from strength to strength, with a third of pupils in London now taking part, and the scheme expanding across the rest of the UK.
You can read about the history of International Walk to School on the IWalk website.
