Healthy People 2010 has indicated that Hispanic and low-income populations need to be targeted for additional support and intervention as they demonstrate significant needs both as children and adults. Hispanic's of all ages exhibit higher rates of obesity and diabetes compared to other populations. Moreover, poverty has been found to be a strong predictor of poor health and decreased physical activity. Therefore, young Hispanic children from low-income families are very much in need of special intervention services to offset patterns of inactivity and poor health that are often established in the early years. The purpose of this study was to examine the influence of a 12-week, school-based motor skill program (Successful Kinesthetic Instruction for Lifelong Learning: SKILL) on the fundamental motor skills of young disadvantaged Hispanic children. Participants consisted of 104 children with a mean age of 54.24 months (SD=3.85) enrolled in a compensatory preschool program for disadvantaged children. Three classes of preschool children were assigned to a SKILL (n=58) group and a Comparison (n=46) group. All children were evaluated on the Test of Gross Motor Development prior to and following the SKILL program yielding a Gross Motor Development Quotient (GMDQ) score, a locomotor subscale score, and an object control subscale score. The children in the SKILL group received the SKILL program consisting of two, 45-min sessions of motor skill instruction per week over a 12-week period. Prior to the intervention, examination of the GMDQ scores revealed a mean score of 71.43 (SD=14.02) for the SKILL group and 80.26 (SD=13.39) for the Comparison group indicating that the groups of children were developmentally delayed. Following the intervention, an ANOVA with repeated measures on the GMDQ scores revealed a significant Group by Time interaction (F[1,102]=272.34, p=.000, h2 =.73) indicating that the SKILL group improved more than the Comparison group from pretest to posttest. A post-hoc univariate ANOVA showed that the SKILL group had significantly better GMDQ scores than the Comparison group at the posttest (F[1,102]=138.35, p=.000). Post-hoc paired sample t-tests revealed that the SKILL group improved significantly from pre-to posttest gain (t[57]=-24.20, p=.000 [2-tailed]) in contrast to the Comparison group that did not show any pretest to posttest gains (t[46]=-.66, p=.51 [2-tailed]). These findings demonstrate the need for organized motor skill programs with this population of children.