First Lady Michelle Obama's "Make Your School A Healthy Worksite" plan for school administrators includes:

- establishing goals for improving healthy behaviors among staff,
- creating opportunities for healthy eating and physical activities and 
- "making changes to create a healthier workplace, such as including incentives for physical activity or walking or biking instead of driving to school."

Here's another necessity for a healthy school: a healthy, unpolluted environment. In September 2010, a new K-5 school in Los Angeles County -- unfortunately named The Carson-Gore Academy of Environmental Sciences -- was found to be built on polluted soil. Administrators assured parents that the school, built on top of an old underground oil pipeline and a gas station with a leaking underground tank, was safe for kids -- but activists and educators are calling for stricter rules about where schools can be built, and how the cleanup should be monitored.

How can students learn how to garden if they're worried about eating vegetables that come out of the soil? Truly healthy schools must have healthy foundations. Tell First Lady Michelle Obama to incorporate the health of school sites and environmental education into her "Let's Move" plan that aims to improve the health of students, families and communities.

Photo credit: Chris Smith