The Santa Monica-Malibu Unified School District announced Grant Elementary School as winner of the fall 2025 Golden Sneaker Award for the district's annual Bike It! Walk It! Bus It! campaign, held Oct. 6-10.
The campaign encourages students, families, staff and community members to use alternative transportation modes including walking, scooters, bicycles, skateboards or public transit instead of cars.
Grant earned top honors with an 85% student participation rate, the highest across the district. The school will receive the Golden Sneaker trophy and celebrate with a schoolwide shaved ice party.
"Our community, particularly our students, have made a commitment to leaving the car at home and walking, biking, scooting or skating to school each day," said Grant Principal Christian Fuhrer. "As a school community, we understand the importance of instilling these practices in our students from a young age, so they become lifelong values."
In the middle school category, the sixth grade class at Lincoln Middle School and seventh grade class at James Adams Middle School led with participation rates of 65% and 49%, respectively. Both grades will celebrate with visits from a shaved ice truck.
According to the City of Santa Monica's 2022 Greenhouse Gas Emissions Inventory Update, 68% of the city's emissions come from vehicle transportation.
The initiative was founded by Santa Monica High School's Solar Alliance group in 2007. The district partnered with the city's Safe Routes to School program, which aims to reduce traffic congestion near schools, increase safety and improve air quality.
The district added the Fareless System Initiative in 2021, encouraging students to use Transit Access Passes for free public transit rides.
Edited by SMDP Staff