Healthy Hustle at Mueller Elementary

 

Helping Students Build Healthy Habits, Confidence, and Leadership

During the 2025–2026 school year, ICT Launchpad partnered with Mueller Elementary School to bring the Healthy Hustle Project to the Mueller Leadership Group.

Each Tuesday, 35 fourth- and fifth-grade students came together to talk about wellness, leadership, food choices, confidence, movement, focus, and what it means to lead by example.

Healthy Hustle was built around one simple idea:

Leadership starts with you doing the right thing. Then it becomes about helping others do the right thing as well.

 

A Year of Leadership in Action

The Mueller Leadership Group gave students a consistent space to grow, share, reflect, and practice leadership in real time.

Through Healthy Hustle, students explored how everyday choices can shape the way they feel, learn, lead, and interact with others. Sessions included conversations and activities around fruits and vegetables, healthier snack options, energy and focus, food groups, movement, self-discipline, confidence, mental wellness, and emotional control.

Students were encouraged to speak up, ask questions, share their own views, participate in activities, and think critically about how healthy habits connect to leadership.

 

What Students Explored

 

Healthy Eating

Students learned about fruits, vegetables, food groups, healthier snacks, and how food choices affect energy and focus.

Energy & Focus

Students discussed how food, water, rest, movement, and daily habits can impact how they show up in school and life.

Mental Wellness

Students talked about confidence, emotional control, self-discipline, and how to handle challenges in a positive way.

Leadership

Students practiced the idea that leadership begins with personal responsibility and grows when we help others make better choices too.

Reflection

Through their Snack Critic notebooks, students practiced reading, writing, reflecting, and expressing their thoughts.

Movement

Movement breaks helped students connect wellness with their bodies, energy, and ability to focus.

 

More Than a Lesson

Healthy Hustle was not designed to be a lecture.

Students shared their thoughts, answered questions, led activities, watched videos, reflected in their notebooks, and discussed real-life choices that affect their health, mindset, and leadership.

They watched videos about where food comes from, explored interesting food facts, participated in food group activities, and connected what they learned to their own lives.

The goal was to help students see wellness as something practical — something they could understand, talk about, and use.

 

By the Numbers

• 35 fourth- and fifth-grade students participated

• Approximately 27 sessions were delivered

• Sessions were held on Tuesdays from 10:00–11:00 a.m.

Growth We Saw

Throughout the year, students grew in visible and meaningful ways.

We saw students become more confident, more mature, more willing to participate, and more comfortable sharing their thoughts. We also saw growth in curiosity, discipline, peer interaction, and understanding of healthy choices.

Teachers and school leadership shared that students involved in the Mueller Leadership Group showed improved behavior after joining the program.

That growth is what Healthy Hustle was really about: helping students build habits, confidence, and leadership skills that can carry beyond the classroom.

 

The Launchpad Leadership Survival Kit

At the end of the year, students received Launchpad Leadership Survival Kits as a final reminder of the lessons they had practiced throughout the program.

Each kit was designed to reinforce the message that leadership is built through daily choices, preparation, discipline, reflection, and care for others.

The survival kits served as a simple but meaningful way to close the year and remind students that they already have tools within them to lead.

 

Media Recap

Photos, videos, and recap content were collected throughout the year to celebrate student growth and document the Healthy Hustle Project.

Student names are not listed on this page to protect privacy.

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Insert video recap here
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A Message from Mueller

“I also want to thank you for your support, encouragement, and partnership. Working alongside people who genuinely care makes all the difference, and I am incredibly grateful for the impact you continue to make on our students and school community.

Your kindness, dedication, and positivity do not go unnoticed. I appreciate you more than words can fully express!”

— Mr. Glover, Mueller Elementary Principal

 

Building the Healthy Hustle Vision

The Healthy Hustle Project is part of ICT Launchpad’s broader vision to help young people grow as healthy, confident, capable leaders.

This work also helps lay the foundation for a larger Digital Youth Wellness Hub, where students and families can access youth-friendly wellness resources, positive content, healthy habit tools, and community support.

Through this first phase at Mueller, ICT Launchpad used leadership sessions, student participation, photo and video storytelling, and school partnership to bring the Healthy Hustle vision to life.

 

Thank You

ICT Launchpad thanks Mueller Elementary School, Mr. Fair, Glover, the participating students, teachers, families, and the Kansas Health Foundation for helping make this work possible.

This partnership created space for students to learn, grow, reflect, and practice leadership in a positive environment.

 

What Comes Next

Healthy Hustle is only the beginning.

ICT Launchpad plans to continue building youth wellness and leadership programming that helps students:

• Make healthier choices

• Build confidence

• Practice leadership

• Strengthen self-discipline

• Learn through reflection and creativity

• Connect wellness to everyday life

Future goals include expanding the Healthy Hustle model, building out the Digital Youth Wellness Hub, adding more student-friendly wellness resources, and partnering with more schools, mentors, food access partners, mental health supports, and community leaders.

 

Help Us Build the Next Generation of Healthy Leaders

ICT Launchpad is committed to helping young people grow as leaders, thinkers, and healthy decision-makers.

Partner with us to bring youth wellness and leadership programming to more students.

 

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