Project RUN! launched with 15 Bay Area Schools

BRUTE LABS Launches RUN! Project with 15 Bay Area Schools

RUN! Offers Schools the Tools to Inspire Physical Fitness and Health in Students

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif., — March 30, 2010 — BRUTE LABS, in partnership with Red Rock, announced today the commencement of RUN!, an ambitious yet simple program that positively impacts the way schools and their students approach physical fitness and health awareness. As a SAPPI “Ideas That Matter” grant recipient, BRUTE LABS is partnering with 15 Bay Area schools to fight childhood obesity rates that are on the rise. RUN! instills in students and members of the community the importance of leading an active life.

“BRUTE LABS created the RUN! project because childhood fitness is one of our top priorities,” said Jason Shafton, executive director of BRUTE LABS. “It is key for us to work together with children, schools and communities so that we are all personally invested in the success of RUN! We also wanted to challenge ourselves further and stay true to our open-source initiatives by creating a project that is both scalable and low-cost, so that communities anywhere can easily implement RUN!”

Inspiring Students to Lace Up and RUN!

RUN! does more than simply ask kids to race around the schoolyard. The project aims to reinvigorate physical education curricula by teaching students how to set personal fitness goals and about the importance of overall health while making it fun and exciting. With individual and group tracking tools, the project aims to highlight self-improvement and drive students’ determination to press harder.

"This project isn't about who crosses the finish line first," said Bernadette Kim, co-project manager for RUN!. "It's about showing children that no matter where they start off, there is always room for improvement!"

BRUTE LABS has partnered with graphic designer Vanessa Maynard and a team of designers from Nike (Erick Goto, Will Green, Kristen Shenk) to create stunning RUN! visuals that speak directly to students. These visuals, included in “RUN! in a box”, are displayed on bilingual pamphlets distributed to parents, student tracking cards, promotional posters and on the website at www.brutelabs.org/run.

Additional RUN! Information

RUN! will last through the spring of 2010. More information on the project is available at www.brutelabs.org/run. After the project is complete, instructions for individuals interested in initiating RUN! in their own communities will be made available on the BRUTE LABS website, www.brutelabs.org/run.

List of participating schools:

· East Palo Alto

- Cesar Chavez Elementary

· Mountain View

- Mariano Castro Elementary

- Theuerkauf Elementary

· Penngrove

- Penngrove Elementary

· San Jose

- Adelante Dual Language Academy

- Canoas Elementary

- Christopher Elementary

- Del Roble Elementary

- Hayes Elementary

- Lyndale Elementary

- McEntee Academy

- Miner Elementary

- Painter Elementary

- Ryan Elementary

- Stipe Elementary

For information about an earlier pilot of the RUN! project visit: http://www.brutelabs.org/run.html

More information on Red Rock: www.redrockcoffee.org

More information on SAPPI “Ideas that Matter”: www.sappi.com/ideasthatmatterNA

-the BRUTES

run! with BRUTE LABS and Red Rock

We're excited to announce run! at Red Rock, the second and latest project we're doing in partnership with this great Mountain View non-profit coffee shop. Last year, we raised over $8,000 to fund fresh water wells in Ghana as part of our Well Done campaign. As our sponsor for the run! at schools project, which recently won a $10k Sappi Ideas that Matter grant to incentize low-income elementary school kids to get healthier, Red Rock shares our passion to promote healthier living in kids and adults alike.

run! at Red Rock is a 3-month campaign to promote health, fitness and community-building in the Mountain View, California area (and beyond!). We launched on February 8, and it will run until at least April of this year. We hope that we can inspire and empower each person who participates to build healthy habits, achieve their fitness goals, meet others along the way, and above all, have fun doing it! So whether its running, cycling, swimming, rock climbing, going out for a walk, or something else, we want to celebrate and encourage everyone to get outside or to the gym to get their hearts beating and blood flowing.

To help participants get up and move, we've created a run! at Red Rock site, where people can log their activities, and compete for prizes and bragging rights.

Red Rock community members will be leading a number of events, including group bike rides and runs, and yoga workshops. We've also created a run! kit just for this campaign, which includes a run! t-shirt, pedometer and REI water bottle, which we're selling at Red Rock for $12.66 (our cost).

Partnering with local businesses

We've also partnered with the following local businesses to provide prizes and workshops to run! at Red Rock participants:

• REI Mountain View
• Crossfit Palo Alto
• Planet Granite in Sunnyvale
  
• zPizza in Mountain View
  
  

Join run! at Red Rock

Of course, you can participate too, whether or not you live near Mountain View. Visit the run! at Red Rock site for more information. If you live in or are visiting the Bay Area, be sure to drop by Red Rock and show your support!

Red Rock Coffee
201 Castro Street
Mountain View, CA 94041
http://run.brutelabs.org

Many members of BRUTE LABS and the staff at Red Rock came together to make run! at Red Rock possible. Here are a few of the notable individuals:

• John Dustman, Steve Joh, and Erin Brewbaker for representing Red Rock
  
• Danny Bowman, Gloria Tzou, and Jason Shafton for heroic efforts on the run! site
• Emily Jayne Scott, Alice Wang, and Joshua To for the amazing design work