53% of 13-year-old American girls are unhappy with their bodies. This number grows to 78% by the time girls reach 17. Education on body image is crucial to avoid destructive behaviors and to free children and teens from worrying about their bodies so that they can focus on school, their families, and their activities. Just as education on alcohol, drugs, and sex has been implemented into curriculum, so will body image.

The reason this program starts at a young age is because it's important to catch them at an impressionable time and teach them body acceptance and inner beauty before they are inundated with negative and harmful messages. These children will then age during the 5 year program into teenagers and young adults. They will then be able to go on through life, making a positive impact on others and their future children. As an entire generation gains, a world of future generations does too.

Beginning with the younger children, in 12 months success would be to see general acceptance towards children of all body sizes and healthy eating habits. Three years from then, the students will be able to ignore the daily negative messages media and society sends them and accept their bodies. At the end of the 5 year period, students will have extraordinary ability in accepting themselves and others and are motivated to teach it to younger generations.

The program will begin in 4th grade health/PE classes, making the children aware of their bodies and the beauty inside them. They will write a letter to themselves to be saved for review at the end of the program. Over 5 years, we will introduce social media's impact and how to ignore it, why a positive body image is beneficial, acceptance towards all body types, eating disorder awareness, and healthy nutritional and exercise habits. It will start locally and hopefully expand around the nation.