Implementing Safe Routes to School in Low-Income Schools and Communities: A Resource Guide for Volunteers and Professionals

Safe Routes to School (SRTS) is a federal program designed to make it safer for more children to walk and bicycle to school. While Safe Routes to School is a relatively new program, all 50 states have funding to help schools and communities improve the environment for walking and bicycling. The program helps get children more physically active, and can help schools and communities struggling with safety, rising bus transportation costs, traffic challenges and a lack of connection between the school and the community. Children from low-income families are twice as likely to walk to school as children from higher-income families. And they face greater risks—children from low-income households have a higher risk of being injured or killed as pedestrians. So it is critical that as Safe Routes to School is implemented across the country that low-income schools and communities are able to access funds and implement Safe Routes to School programs.