The season of giving brought a useful gift to the Northwest R-1 School District’s Valley Middle School.
As part of an initiative called Mission Tiger, Kellogg’s and Tony the Tiger donated $29,000 to the school to buy new fitness equipment for its physical education and fitness classes.
The equipment also will bolster the school’s new after-school sports programs, said Jessica Young, Valley Middle physical education and fitness teacher.
The donation was presented to the school during a Dec. 14 assembly, and the school already has ordered a treadmill, two rowers, an elliptical, lightweights, medicine balls, two jump boxes, as well as several other pieces of equipment, Young said.
She said some of the equipment already has arrived, and the rest is expected to be delivered after the Christmas break.
Young, who also coaches junior varsity basketball and girl’s lacrosse at Northwest R-1 High School, applied for the donation through DonorsChoose.org.
She said she didn’t expect to receive the entire $29,000.
“Then, they contacted me, saying that Kellogg’s Mission Tiger wanted to fund the entire thing,” Young said. “I was like, ‘Oh my gosh, this is amazing.’”
The new equipment will revitalize the fitness space, which had outdated equipment.
“(The fitness center is) actually an old gym,” Young said. “We had hand-me-down equipment from stores that would donate, and then we had stuff from the old weight room from the high school. Pretty much everything we had was falling apart or rusting, so it’s in pretty bad shape. So, having this donation is amazing.”
The Northwest district added new sport programs at the middle school level this school year, including girls volleyball, boys soccer and boys and girls basketball.
“I think starting the new middle school sports is going to help feed our high school,” Northwest R-1 High School activities director Kyle Wampler said.
“I think the same thing for the weight room, that it creates an opportunity to work out daily and it could be part of their everyday routine. So, when they get to high school, and they’re a high school athlete, it’s just a habit.”
Wampler said the addition of a weight room, alongside the new middle school sports, will even the playing field when Northwest High students compete against athletes from other schools that already had middle school sports.
Young agreed.
“This will definitely help build their skills and also help them with getting stronger in general for the skills in whatever sport they choose in high school,” she said.
Young said she’s happy the school was awarded the grant.
“We have so many good kids who try so hard, and they deserve to have something nice to actually use,” she said. “Giving them this opportunity to have this new equipment to better themselves is going to be awesome.”
Wampler said he is grateful Young took the initiative to apply for the grant.
“For our coaches and staff, that’s what we want,” Wampler said. “We want (coaches) to kind of be self-motivated and know they don’t need me or a principal to say you need to do this (or) you need to do that.”
Young said the response from students and teachers has been positive.
“The kids were amazing at the assembly,” Young said. “All the teachers even were like, well, maybe we can use some of this equipment. It’s going to be awesome to get everybody involved.”
Kellogg’s Mission Tiger initiative is designed to raise awareness and funding for school athletics. Since its launch in 2019, Mission Tiger has helped more than 1 million kids across the country by providing support for school sports programs, according to its website.