A desire to present a course for sixth-grade female students on healthy living earned a Sanger teacher a $5,000 cash prize recently.

The Avon Hello Tomorrow Fund — a contest funded by Avon Products Inc. — named Sanger Sixth Grade Campus science and health teacher Kathy Hootman its weekly contest winner last week. The contest recognizes people for their work in presenting programs that improve society while also empowering girls and young women.

DRC/Al Key

Kathy Hootman, who teaches science and health at the Sanger Sixth Grade Campus, received $5,000 from the Avon Hello Tomorrow Fund. With the prize money, she’ll start a class tailored for girls.

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“I was excited,” Hootman said.  “I had already sort of did the math and thought they had given all 17 [awards] away, so I didn’t remotely think that I got it.” 

A panel of 11 judges that included personal finance expert Suze Orman, actress Phylicia Rashad and Duchess of York Sarah Ferguson selected Hootman’s application as one of the weekly winners from more than 750 applications nationwide.

Judges wrote that it clearly exemplified a unique approach to empowering girls and women.

“This single idea can have a big, long-term impact,” Carol Zurzig, executive director of the Avon Foundation and panel judge, said in a statement.

Hootman said she knew in the summer that she wanted to offer a health course for her adolescent female students. Around the start of the school year, while searching on the Internet for possible grants to help in funding the course, she ran across the Avon contest and applied.

With her earnings, she plans to purchase a computer and other resources needed for daily classes, she said.

Hootman said she often thinks of herself at her students’ age.

She said she remembers being embarrassed in school because she was “an early bloomer” and was going through body changes before many of her peers.

Even now, she said, she notices that she doesn’t have good eating habits. Hootman said she wanted to present a class for her students where she could learn with them about healthy eating and teach body changes and maturity — something rarely taught anymore.

“I’m excited, and I think it’s a great opportunity for them,” she said.

Hootman expects about 25 girls to enroll in the health education course. The courses are expected to offer interactive classes on healthy cooking techniques and exercise routines. Class topics will include proper eating habits, appropriate portion sizes and exercise programs, improved self-image and self-awareness.

At some point, Hootman hopes to offer screenings for diabetes, cholesterol, blood pressure and thyroid levels as part of the course, she said.

Sixth Grade Center Principal Steve Skelton said he wasn’t surprised that discussions are already under way to offer Hootman’s program as an additional health elective in the afternoon next semester, and he’s excited about its benefits for students.

“I think it will be a very good class for our girls in dealing with healthy lifestyles and developing healthy lifestyles, and hopefully, we can give them some good advice about what a healthy lifestyle is,” he said.

BRITNEY TABOR can be reached at 940-566-6876. Her e-mail address is btabor@dentonrc.com .