Join Us in the Sky During National Kite Month - April 2000.

If you have a free afternoon next April, you’re invited to join the biggest kite happening ever planned in North America.

The AKA, in cooperation with the Kite Trade Association has declared April to be National Kite Month. Kite Month. 1999 was a huge success, and April 2000 looks like it will be even better!

Our goals for Kite Month are to encourage flying and promote the joys of kiting as an educational, recreational, and sporting pastime. To make that possible, AKA and KTA are supporting a number of projects.

First, we plan to provide professional media support for the major kite events in an effort to get them on national television, magazines, and newspapers. Starting with the Smithsonian, and including Maryland, Miami, and Phoenix, Kite Month hopes to use the excitement of these large scale events to communicate what contemporary kiting is all about.

Second, we want to encourage smaller local fun flies, exhibitions, workshops and programs across the country. We anticipate that every AKA club and member merchant will put something on the calendar. We urge individual members to organize events too. To make this possible, the official Kite Month Headquarters will provide free media and logistical support. Our goal is to register 250 events during the month.

Third, we are planning to produce a complete educational program, designed by teachers, that can be used to bring kiting to the classroom as a tool to teach science, math, history, art, ecology, and aesthetics. We plan to make the program available on the web and to promote it to every teacher in the country.

And finally, we intend to help the industry by scheduling member receptions at local kite stores where you can get “inside information” and discounts on the newest kite products from KTAI manufacturers.

What can you do to get involved?? Attend the big events! Organize a local fly! Do two of them if you like. More is better!! Then contact your local store and offer to help them with a reception! Think it’s too wet or cold outside? Schedule an indoor demonstration! That’s sure to get media attention. And don’t forget to call your local school and offer to present a kite workshop.

According to Steering Committee Chairman David Gomberg, Kite month is designed to reach as many people as possible. “What we need,” says Gomberg, “is for as many members as possible to organize simple festivals, workshops and fun flies. Imagine, if only one-in-ten AKA members visits a classroom, or registers an event, there will be 400 programs across the country -- each reaching dozens of more people and generating kite media”.

To accomplish these goals, National Kite Month Headquarters will provide the following direct services:

· Issue press releases to targeted national and regional print media promoting National Kite Month and encouraging kite flying. The releases will include a list of registered events and retail store contacts.

· Sub-contract with a professional agency to promote national television coverage of National Kite Month with a special focus on the five large festivals.

· Issue press releases to local media supporting every registered event organized by a KTAI member or AKA Affiliated Club.

Kite Month Headquarters will also provide the following support services:

· Instructions for registering and organizing a participating kite festival,

· Instructions for organizing a school kite making project.

· Sample proclamations which can be adopted by local or state governments.

· Sample press releases and photos.

· An official National Kite Month logo.

· A "National Kite Month Web Site" where information will be available for downloading by local organizers, teachers, and members of the media.

· A "National Kite Month Hotline" for phone questions and information.

According to Gomberg, “We envision the web site to be set up as a "do-it-yourself" resource where a local Kiwanis Club can get the information they need to organize their own local kite festival, and where an elementary school teacher can learn how to do a short unit on kiting including some of the history, physics and science as well as instructions for holding a kitemaking class.”

The Kite Month project provides you with the focus, tools and resources you need to draw more people to kiting. Media will be provided by professionals; instructions will be developed by experts; and insurance and permits will be provided through AKA sanctioning. But success will depend on the initiative of individuals and member businesses.

We need your involvement to make Kite Month a success.

Contact our national office to register your Kite Month event, to register all Kite Month activities and prepare a master calendar. You can reach us by phone at 760-322-4128, fax 760-770-0415, or email NationalKiteMonth@AKA.Kite.org. Kite Month web pages can be reached through www.KiteTrade.org/NationalKiteMonth/.

And don’t forget to go fly a kite!