Impact by Demographic

• What makes the decline of free play time in school even more troubling is that recess is not evenly distributed across race and socioeconomic status. One nationwide study on elementary schools published in 2003 found that on a given day only sixty one percent of African American students had recess, while eighty five percent of white students had recess. Additionally, only fifty six percent of students living below the poverty line had recess while eighty three percent of students living above the poverty line had recess. The research shows that recess is beneficial for students, so the fact that children who are wealthy and children who are white are more likely to get the benefit of recess is not fair to these marginalized populations.

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