(Sept. 10, 2022) For Tiffany Williams and Allison Swank, their 13-student wellness education class at Pinellas Park Middle School on Friday was an epicenter of innovation.
A monitor showed a PowerPoint presentation that included a video featuring Bucs quarterback Tom Brady. Words like “pliability” were written on a whiteboard. Foam rollers vibrated, pliability spheres rolled, and instructions explained foundational movements to loosen the muscles of their eighth grade students.
Pinellas Park Middle School is one of 10 pilot schools in the district — four high schools and six middle schools — integrating Brady’s TB12 Method into their health and wellness curriculum this year. Through a partnership among Pinellas County Schools, the Pinellas Education Foundation and the TB12 Foundation, there’s now a semester-based course at the middle schools and a one-credit course at the high schools.
Pinellas County Schools is the first district in the nation to revise its curriculum to include Brady’s holistic approach to wellness with the help of certified TB12 body coaches, the district said in a news release.
“For us to be able to get a peek into what (Brady’s) been doing to help him play so long, I think it’s great,” Williams said of the 45-year-old quarterback, who is playing his 23rd season in the NFL.
And they’re just getting started.
By next school year, PCS is scheduled to roll out the program’s daily health habits at all of its middle and high schools, said pre-K-12 health and physical education specialist Ashley Grimes.
“This wasn’t a thing 10 years ago,” Swank said. “These are current trends, and we’re not with adults doing this. We’re doing it with kids.”