For the past three days, Ride2School have been working with students from Howrah Primary School, fine tuning their bike skills in preparation for the Schools Triathlon Challenge.
Ride2School is a proud partner of the Schools Triathlon Challenge which will be held in both Devonport and Hobart in late November and early December this year.
Aligned closely to Ride2School, the Schools Triathlon aims to promote active and healthy lifestyle choices, while providing a pathway for students to participate in physical activity.
Working with students from grades three to six, Ride2School’s Bike Ed program is a practical course which teaches students the basic skills of riding a bike safely and confidently in different environments.
In running a bike education course, Ride2School is hoping that the skills learned over the past three days will not only help students complete the challenge, but that more students will embrace riding to school, more often.
Ride2School funding in doubt
While Bicycle Network’s Ride2School program would love to run more activities and initiatives like this across Tasmania, the program’s future is in doubt, with State Government funding only secured until the end of this school year.
Bicycle Network is continuing to work with the government on where future funding will come from.
Our biggest hurdle is securing a long-term deal and knowing which bucket the money will come from. What is certain is that future funding will have to come from various departments.
Ride2School embraces road safety, infrastructure, education and health and we strongly believe that a whole-of-government approach was needed to fund it.
If you’d like to see Ride2School expanded across Tasmania and refunded so that we can continue to do our work with school’s like Howrah Primary, please help us by emailing Premier Will Hodgman and politely ask him not to cut Ride2School funding.
With your help we can pressure the government to stop dragging its heels and take Ride2School out of the ‘too-hard’ basket for the sake of local kids.
There’s still so much more work to do to get more Tassie kids happy, healthy and active and it would be an incredible shame to see our work cut short.