It’s been a week of memorable moments. Let’s recount just a few…

On Monday, we celebrated the launch of a great new Earn-A-Bike partnership with Ferguson-Florissant. On Tuesday we started the morning with a wonderful email from a Learn-To-Ride parent that read in part, “My son, [___], got a bike for his third birthday. He fell the very first time and refused to touch a bike again for the next five years! I am so thankful that BWorks offers these lessons for kids who haven’t learned yet. … He left week four feeling confident on a bike. He has biked for hours every day since, including five miles and seven miles trail rides!” We loved hearing that so much. And then we met six more brand-new LTR students up at St. Vincent Park later that day!

Wednesday proved an especially productive day for our mechanical team, with both the bike and computer refurbishment teams cranking out machines for soon-to-be youth graduates. Then Thursday we continued our work with Earn-A-Computer and Earn-A-Bike students on both sides of the bi-state, while other volunteers and staff pushed forward on multiple fronts back at the Soulard shop. We’re wrapping up the week today (Saturday) with a Learn-To-Ride graduation day at the Bellefontaine Rec Center and the launch of our latest Granite City Earn-A-Bike cohort, hosted by Six Mile Regional Library District.

We’re very grateful to all the people and organizations who make all of this and more possible each week, from our donors and staff and volunteers, to intrepid caregivers and hosting locations, to critical supporters of specific class cohorts, including both @Great Rivers Greenway and the Agency for Community Transit (MCT) currently. Have a wonderful weekend, everyone!

Dreaming about a #bikebus for your school? St. Louis BWorks can help!

“Can we please do this every day?” The question we hear time and time again from young local cyclists during bike-to-school days has only grown louder and more urgent for the BWorks team in recent years. And that’s prompting us to offer the following answers to some related questions we are hearing more often as well — from caring adults eager to make big things happen for children in our shared community.

Take a read! Got a #bikebus question we didn’t answer below? Email evie@bworks.org. We look forward to serving as a resource for those in the St. Louis area who are passionate about making active transportation possible, fun and safe for local kids!

What IS a bike bus?

Each bike bus is part of a growing international children’s active transportation movement that empowers kids to get to and from school in an active, joyful, sustainable form — using their very own energy! And just like school buses have bus drivers, bike buses also have bus drivers, so to speak — crews of dedicated adult helpers who work closely with school champions to plan and execute the rides.

Can you point me to some past examples?

Yes! Here in the bi-state region, the City of Edwardsville has been an early adopter, with community volunteers organizing multi-week bike buses at three local elementary schools every fall and spring. In St. Louis City, St. Louis Public Schools’ Betty Wheeler Junior Classical Academy launched its first bike bus in collaboration with BWorks in April 2025, and Soulard School continues to grow its semesterly effort, which regularly draws upwards of 100 participants. BWorks also partners with City Garden Montessori School on a roundtrip bike bus for three weeks in the fall and in the spring. Here are some recent BWorks-guided bike bus photos.

In addition to a map of bike buses all across the U.S. and the world (and yes, we’ve started adding St. Louis-area bike buses to their map!), Bike Bus World has a great guide on how to start a bike bus as well as other resources on their website.

I’m ready to get started. How can BWorks support our bike bus launch?

Let’s start with a phone call or even a visit to your school about six to eight weeks out from launch, so that we can understand your vision and reasoning for this joyful and challenging undertaking, address any initial concerns, and then help you chart out some next steps to bring your vision to reality.

The latter may include route consultation; assistance with participant and volunteer recruitment and management (e.g. assigning various roles to confirmed volunteers); providing an interactive school assembly focused on keeping our bodies, bikes and community safe to help students remember the bike bus is coming up and create both buzz and safety awareness in advance of the first event; a “quick fix” event in the days leading up to the bike bus launch, with BWorks mechanics on hand for about two hours to provide free drop-in repairs for student bikes; loaner supplies such as long cable locks to keep bikes safe during school day; and more.

Long story short: Get in touch with us! Email info@bworks.org to get the conversation going. We can’t wait to ride to school with you.

Ninety-seven students joined us for a dozen different bike and computer class sessions over the course of this week, all under the guidance of 13 dedicated staff and volunteer BWorks teachers! Meanwhile, another small army of volunteers pushed forward on tasks at our newly purchased building, while still other crews of hard-working helpers continued refurbishing computers and bikes in our workshops at our current headquarters. Our youth-focused activities took us to four schools, one library, the International Institute, various local bike shops that help us collect donated bikes, and to a special event at the Agency for Community Transit, all while we welcomed many wonderful customers and families at our headquarters during retail hours. Now we’re savoring this sunny weekend and celebrating our first graduating Learn-To-Ride cohort of the calendar year! We hope you’ve been able to get outdoors too before temps plunge again for a bit.