Marine Corps Base Quantico -- “Can you all say ‘Ooh Rah’?” Rick Nealis, Marine Corps Marathon (MCM) director, asked the 700 children packed into the Claremont Immersion Elementary School gymnasium. “That’s the only way my two dogs, Miles and Molly, will come out.”

“Ooh Rah!” screamed the Arlington, Virginia elementary-schoolers as the two mascots of the Marine Corps Marathon made their way to the front of the room, children tumbling out of the rows painstakingly organized by their teachers to give them high fives.

Miles and Molly, along with Nealis, MCM staff and four Marine volunteers visited Claremont Feb. 5 to present the Healthy School Award. The award is given to the five schools — out of 500 — that send the most students to participate in the MCM Kids Run, a mile-long race held the Saturday before the marathon.

Two hundred Claremont students ran in the MCM Kids Run this past October. Each winning school received a $1,000 check from Sodexo and a concert by Jump with Jill, a rock and roll nutrition education show.

Jason Cash, one of the school’s Physical Education teachers, said that Claremont parents brought the Kids Run to the school’s attention four years ago. Since P.E. is the only department that sees every child in the school, he and the other P.E. teacher began promoting it heavily. Students in grades three, four, and five run laps around the gym for half of every P.E. lesson and kids in the lower grade levels do other kinds of loco-motor activities—so Claremont kids are well set up to be MCM Kids Run finishers.

“All kids in elementary school love P.E.,” Cash said, “but in middle and high school you see it drop off. So it’s about building healthy habits from an early age. Being healthy is going to improve the quality and the length of their lives. Of course, younger kids aren’t thinking that way — they’re in to having fun! So we teach it in a fun way, which is important for habit formation.”

Larry McMarlin, district manager for Sodexo, said the company has 1,200 school contracts for food service and a contract with Marine Corps Base Quantico as well, so this was a natural event for Sodexo to support.

“It’s a good way to give back to the community,” he said.

He said health and nutrition are important to Sodexo.

“Our menus are written with input by nutritionists, we buy local products, and we use sustainable materials,” McMarlin said.

“Our health could really break us as a country,” he continued. “We never had conversations about healthy eating when I was young. We need to start educating our children about healthy food at this age so that when they grow up, the idea will stick.”

Lance Cpl. Lanay Chambers, Marine Corps Embassy Security Group, said she volunteered to help out at the award event because “it’s always good to get involved with the future generations.”

“It’s important to be healthy because it increases your self-esteem and confidence,” she said.

Sgt. Nivia Huskey, HMX-1, said she volunteered for the fun of being around little kids. The mother of a one-year-old, she’s more interested than ever in modeling healthy, creative decision-making.

“It’s so easy to give the ‘easy’ foods and not think about other options that are available,” she said. “Yogurt instead of ice cream, for example. Fruits and vegetables can be easy, they just take a little more planning.”

This is the primary message of Jump with Jill.

“We have to respect our one body!” “Jill” (aka Hailey McDonell) told the students. “We’re going to have this body our whole lives. And whose job is it to take care of it?”

“Mine!” replied the kids.

Respecting your body means choosing the best foods to fuel it: fruits, vegetables, eggs, low-fat milk, etc.

“You should want to take care of yourself and be healthy,” said Mark Jayne, Jump with Jill’s DJ. He conceived of the show 10 years ago with his sister Jill Jayne, the original Jill. Jump with Jill has performed more than 2,000 shows nationwide and in Europe and has been seen by 750,000 children.

“We’re teaching nutrition tools and tips to last a lifetime,” Jayne said. “It’s about physical fitness, empowerment and self-efficacy. And we teach it through music and dance.”

The 700 Claremont Elementary schoolers doing the watermelon shimmy in celebration of “nature’s candy” — fruit — seemed to have learned the lesson well.

— Writer: auphausconner@quanticosentryonline.com