Poster Contest Illuminates Sun-safe Behaviors

Annual competition gives students chance to raise awareness, win prizes;
deadline: April 7, 2010

(Denver, Colo.– October 22, 2009) Students can help raise awareness about sun safety and win prizes by entering the 2010 SunWise with SHADE poster contest. The annual contest is a joint effort by the SHADE Foundation of America, WeatherBug Schools and the Environmental Protection Agency to teach children ways to protect their skin and eyes from excessive sun exposure. Last year's winner, a 13-year-old fromBernville, Pa., showed a girl talking to her friend about her unhealthy relationship with the sun.

Too much sun can lead to skin cancer, cataracts and other eye damage, and immune system suppression. Sun protection is especially important for children because unprotected exposure in childhood increases the chances of developing the most dangerous form of skin cancer, melanoma. One in 55 children born in 2005 will develop melanoma during their lifetime—almost 30 times higher than the rate for people born in 1930.

"As the school year gets under way, this contest is the perfect way to remind families and schools that simple steps like wearing hats, sunglasses and shirts, using sunscreen, and staying in the shade can greatly reduce their risk of getting a sunburn, or worse, skin cancer," said Wendy Dew, EPA's Environmental Education Coordinator in Denver. "In fact, skin cancer is the most common form of cancer in the United States. The SunWise with SHADE poster contest is a fun, creative way to increase awareness of the importance of being safe in the sun."

Being SunWise is especially important for people living in the Rocky Mountain West and Great Plains states because of the higher altitudes, sunny weather, and the availability of so many outdoor recreation opportunities. People who engage in activities like skiing, for example, need to be aware of the risk associated with sun exposure. Snow can reflect up to 80 percent of the sun's ultraviolet (UV) radiation. These risk factors can lead to higher incidences of disease. Utah, in particular, continues to make the top 10 list of states with the highest incidence of melanoma. The poster contest offers students a great opportunity to get the word out about the importance of sun-safe behaviors in the Mountains and Plains region and elsewhere.

The contest due date is April 7, 2010. Starting this year, there are two age categories for poster entries—kindergarten through third grade, and fourth through eighth grade. Students in both categories must submit hand-drawn posters on 8.5 x 11 inch pieces of paper. Entries should be original, creative, show ways to prevent skin cancer and raise sun safety awareness, and must be attached to an official entry form, which can be found at

http://www.shadefoundation.org/programs/poster-contest/

Poster winners receive state and national prizes, with the national winner in the 4th-8th grade category receiving a family trip to Disney World and a WeatherBug Tracking Station for his/her school with lifetime access to WeatherBug Achieve.

The WeatherBug Schools Program (http://www.weatherbugschools.com)
is committed to providing an engaging teaching tool for schools nationwide. With WeatherBug, teachers can create customized learning activities based on current and historical weather conditions from the WeatherBug Tracking Station and compare local conditions to 8,000 other stations nationwide.

The SHADE Foundation's mission is to erad­i­cate melanoma through the edu­ca­tion of chil­dren and the com­mu­nity in the pre­ven­tion and detec­ tion of skin can­cer and the pro­mo­tion of sun safety.

EPA's SunWise Program is an environmental and health education program that uses classroom and community tools to teach children and their caregivers how to protect themselves from overexposure to the sun.

More than 80,000 students have helped spread the message of sun safety by participating in the annual contest since its creation in 2003. Additional information on SunWise and the 2010 SHADE poster contest is available at http://www.epa.gov/sunwise/ .

Posted on Monday, November 02, 2009