Discover > Magazine > September 2012 > Spotlight: Bullard High School Key Club
< September 2012 magazine
MORE THAN FUN AND GAMES
Bullard High School Key Club gets kids active
story by Danielle Karstens
Kids love to transform cardboard boxes into secret
forts, princess castles or speeding racecars. At least,
that’s what Cullen Hippler discovered at his Key Club’s
Worldwide Day of Play event. As the Key Club president
at Bullard High School in Bullard, Texas, Hippler
helped organize the Nickelodeon-sponsored event and
said it was the perfect activity to kick off the school year.
Club members hosted the event at a park, but they
didn’t limit themselves to the playground equipment.
Members set up fun activities ranging from
kickball to face painting.
“The cardboard boxes were de finitely a big hit,”
Hippler said. “We’re a small club, and we’re always
looking for low-cost projects. We didn’t try to go over
the top and come up with dif cult activities because
the kids’ attention spans are pretty low. We stuck with
simple toys that we knew kids would have fun with.”
The Bullard Key Club tailored its event to students
from kindergarten through sixth grade. More than
100 children and their families chose to abandon the
television and participate in the Day of Play.
“We wanted to make sure this was a family day,”
says Key Club advisor Tabitha Hippler, Cullen’s
mother. “A lot of [parents] brought picnic lunches
and spent the whole day at the park, even though
our event was from 11 to 2.”
The Day of Play served as a great bonding opportunity
for other members of the Kiwanis family as
well. In addition to the 43 Key Club volunteers, Kiwanis
and Builders Club members got involved by
grilling hot dogs and facilitating games with the kids.
Because of everyone’s teamwork, the event was even
more successful than Tabitha or Cullen envisioned.
Interested in hosting your own Worldwide Day of
Play? Check out www.nick.com/thebighelp/worldwide-day-of-play.
