Traffic congestion is a perennial issue in many cities and towns around the world. Specialists hail bikes as one solution to the problem – as well as reducing pollution and improving people’s wellbeing. Road congestion has become a modern day menace – contributing to air pollution, safety risks, and big losses in terms of accessibility, economic competitiveness, sustainable growth and social cohesion. WE must respond to these challenges to make our towns and cities sustainable attractive places to live in. Many children and young people in our schools are obese and have unhealthy lifestyles. Parents driving pupils to and from school add to congestion and pollution. Our project aims to work with other cities, large towns, and their partner schools to address these two related problems • traffic congestion and related pollution and safety of those who chose to cycle • lack of exercise by many pupils –resulting in more young people obese and unfit The project’s overall objectives are to • Encourage and supporting more pupils to cycle to school • To reduce traffic particularly around schools • To improve pupils health and wellbeing through more physical activity • Create safe cycle routes to school • Develop pupils as active campaigners • Up-skill teachers to support pupils to take action • To embed lesson promoting use of bicycles in the school curriculum The plan has 3 strands: 1 - Upskilling Teachers, Pupils and Engaging the Community 2- Encouraging more pupils to ride to school 3 – Action- Community Project These stands will be delivered through the development of intellectual outputs, participation in short-term study visits and pupil exchange events and evaluating impact of project actions. Intellectual outputs include: • Baseline assessments and developing the Erasmus+ Impact+ Tool to measure results. • Cross-curricula resources - actively promoting the use of bikes as a mode of transport. • Toolkit to train pupils as campaigners – to produce their own campaigns in their local communities • Impact review tool • On Your Bike Toolkit – to support all stakeholders in encouraging more pupils/people to cycle more often • Final impact review tool – developed from Baseline tool and mid-term impact tool Other activities are: • Three short-term study visits involving job shadowing and project management skills/training pupils as campaigners • Four pupils’ conference to discuss progress and future planning, development of global citizenship skills • Four multiplier events to increase uptake and/or use of resources produced. The participants in this project are: 14 Schools 4 Local Authorities/Regional Public Bodies 2 Education/teacher/research centres The vision of the project is wide but not unachievable and in-line with the vision of cities and towns part of the project. The overall expected impacts of the project are: • to provide safer and cleaner environments and for communities to live in cleaner, more open urban environments. • Create safe conditions for pupils and their families/local communities to participate more frequently in cycling to school/work and leisure activities • Contribute to the overall health and well-being of pupils and future generations
At the start our intention was to encourage children and families to cycle more to reduce congestion, air pollution and to make our towns and cities sustainable attractive places to live in. Throughout the second half of this project, Covid-19 has dramatically impacted the things we wanted to do. For example, pupil and staff travel has not been possible since March 2020 and school closures have made in-class teaching difficult and often impossible because of lengthy school closures. Indeed, many of our other Erasmus+ projects have found it difficult to keep everyone on board and keep the project going. In the case of this project, however, the reverse has happened. The results have been incredible with lockdowns providing parents and young people the opportunity to get on their bikes and explore. Parents and carers have engaged in school led projects to get their children fit and healthy whilst they, themselves, have enjoyed time with their children and rediscovered the pleasures of getting on a bike. As planned, our young people have campaigned and encouraged more pupils to cycle to school, thus reducing traffic around schools and improving pupils’ health and wellbeing through more physical activity. Teachers have worked collaboratively to develop lessons to support campaigns and further encourage the use of bicycles by pupils, parents and staff, and successfully embedded the promotion of using bicycles across school curricular. The project plan needed dramatically altering as a result of the Coronavirus, however, we have continued to work towards meeting our 3 project strands: 1 - Upskilling Teachers, Pupils and Engaging the Community 2- Encouraging more pupils to ride to school 3 – Action- Community Project We have produced a number of Intellectual Outputs including classroom materials and case studies as part of a thorough impact review. Other activities have included study visits. We managed to achieve 3 face-to-face Transnational Project Management meetings (TPM), 3 Learning Teaching and Training opportunities (LTT), 2 FOR staff and 1 for pupils. After that, all subsequent visits were cancelled because of the pandemic. Also cancelled were the multiplier events. Although dissemination has taken place and some multiplier activity has taken place, the full multiplier events could not be completed as planned. The participants in this project were: 14 Schools 4 Local Authorities/Regional Public Bodies 2 Education/teacher/research centres The vision of the project was ambitious but has not been unachievable despite Covid-19 restrictions, for which all participants can be very proud.