Canadian Government Executive - Volume 22 - Issue 6

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June 2016 // Canadian Government Executive / 29
Design
ence of millions because it was done in
prime time. Canadians were asked to sub-
mit nominations for the best examples of
healthy living programs. The idea was to
actively engage Canadians, and challenge
them to come up with ideas on how to pro-
mote healthier living. Individuals, schools,
families, not-for-profit organizations, and
businesses could enter the competition.
There was a strong incentive: $20,000 for
each of the finalists from LIFT to fund
the development of business plans, and a
grand prize of a $1 million for the winner.
A panel of judges pruned the submitted
ideas to six finalists and celebrities from
various fields of endeavor were recruited
to champion each of the ideas. They were
showcased via social media outlets like
YouTube and Canadians were asked to
choose the winner.
The presentation of the six finalists and
the announcement of the contest winner
were made in a broadcast on the CBC in
January, 2015.
The ideas and their corresponding ce-
lebrity advocates were (they can all be
found on YouTube by typing in “The Play
Exchange”:
• GOODcoins: An app that rewarded us-
ers for making healthy decisions by
awarding them “coins” that can be ex-
changed for prizes. The idea was pro-
moted by Scott McGillivray, host of real-
ity TV show “Income Property.”
• Healthy Schools: A program that prompts
children to make their own healthy de-
cisions in every facet of their lives. The
advocate was Trish Stratus, former WWE
star.
• Prescription to Get Active: A program
that encouraged doctors to write pre-
scriptions for their patients in order to
access fitness facilities and equipment
at no cost. The star supporter for this
idea was Jessica Holmes, actor and co-
median.
• Sharing Dance: A website from the Na-
tional Ballet School that encouraged
activity through dance by offering free
access to the school’s talents online. The
promoter of this idea was Patrick Chan,
Canadian skating celebrity.
• Trottibus: An alternative to the tradi-
tional school bus that sees children
walking to school together in large
groups, encouraging exercise and road
safety. The champion for that idea was
Chantal Petitclerc, the 14-time Paralym-
pic gold medalist.
• Walk to Tuk: A project that challenged
residents of the Northwest Territories
to walk the equivalent of the distance of
the Mackenzie River by walking within
their own neighbourhoods and tracking
their progress. That idea was promoted
by Wab Kinew, host of CBC’s radio pro-
gram “Canada Reads 2015.”
Trottibus was declared the winner and
the idea, backed by the Canadian Can-
cer Society, received the $1 million prize.
The program is now being adopted in
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many schools across the country.
PHAC also came out a winner. “One of
the goals of the Play Exchange was to de-
velop a pipeline of ‘investable’ ideas that
can be implemented to help make Cana-
dians healthier,” according to Hartnell.
“More than 400 ideas were submitted.”
The PHAC can now mine all the entries
for potential projects.
TPX also helped PHAC raise public
awareness to the issue of healthy living:
the nationally televised program reached
more than 300,000 viewers, nearly 80,000
votes were cast across the country for the
winning idea, the TPX Web site generated
280,000 page views, and 6,210 tweets were
made during the voting week. Beyond
these, TPX helped PHAC transition to a
new way of doing business.
“The initiative demonstrated that the
federal government can be innovative in
using program levers to advance a policy
objective, but this is only the beginning
of what we can accomplish,” according
to PHAC. “The concept of ‘challenges’ like
TPX across other social and economic poli-
cy domains holds great promise as a social
innovation tool that can achieve greater
impact.” The Play Exchange (TPX) was
one the finalists in the 2015 the Institute of
Public Administration of Canada (IPAC)/
IBM Innovative Management Awards.
Nestor Arellano is the Managing
Editor of C anadian
Government Executive