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. 2023 Jun 25:35:102301.
doi: 10.1016/j.pmedr.2023.102301. eCollection 2023 Oct.

Not all fun and games: Disparities in school recess persist, and must be addressed

Hannah R Thompson  1 , Rebecca A London  2
Affiliations

Not all fun and games: Disparities in school recess persist, and must be addressed

Hannah R Thompson et al. Prev Med Rep. .

Abstract

School recess is an evidence-backed approach to increase school-based opportunities for students to play, accrue necessary physical activity, and socialize with peers, to the benefit of their physical, academic, and socioemotional health. As such, the Centers for Disease Control recommend at least 20 min of daily recess in elementary schools. However, unequal provision of recess contributes to persistent health and academic disparities for students, which remain to be addressed. We analyzed data from the 2021-22 school year from a sample of low-income (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program Education-eligible) elementary schools (n = 153) across California. Just 56 % of schools reported providing more than 20 min of recess daily. Differences in daily recess provision were apparent, with students in larger and lower-income schools receiving less daily recess than students in smaller and higher income schools. These findings support the enactment of legislation mandating health-sufficient daily recess in California elementary schools. They also highlight the importance of, and need for, annually-collected data sources to enable monitoring of recess provision, and potential disparities, over time, in order to assist in identifying additional interventions to address this public health problem.

Keywords: Academic performance; Mental health; Physical activity; Recess; School health; Schools.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.

References

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