Program offers chance for physical activity

IU faculty and staff won’t need to look further than campus recreation facilities to get in shape this summer.

IU Campus Recreational Sports will bring back the Step Into Fitness Program starting in early July. The program runs July 6-31.  

The program’s purpose is to aid IU’s faculty and staff in achieving a more active, healthier lifestyle. Participants in the free program will count their daily steps using a free pedometer that will track steps and nutrition.

There is no necessary amount of daily steps to join the program, but iurecsports.org offers suggestions of what is a good number. Good is considered to be 6,000 steps daily; better is 8,000 daily steps and excellent is 10,000 steps daily.  

Participants will also be sent weekly e-mails containing nutritional information from registered dieticians at the IU Health Center.

There will be both weekly prizes from Bloomington Bagel Company as well as a grand prize.  

New participants can sign up online at HPER or SRSC Member Services or stop by one of the Step Into Fitness Road Shows, according to iurecsports.org. The road shows will be at various spots all around campus starting with one from noon to 1:30 p.m. Monday at the Kelley School of Business. The road shows will run until Monday, June 29.  

Megan Amadeo, who is in charge of the program, said the road shows are done to get as many of the staff and faculty involved as possible. By having the road shows at different places across campus, Amadeo said she believes that increases the chances of people signing up and amplifies the program’s visibility at the same time.  

Previous Step Into Fitness participants are reregistered and will only have to download the step tracker from iurecsports.org to take part again.  

The creation of the program stemmed from a Campus Recreational Sports survey done by faculty and staff at IU, Amadeo said. The survey found one of their preferred activities was walking.

Because walking is something that can be done essentially anywhere, they decided to create a free program only for faculty and staff, encouraging them to become active using their preferred activity, Amadeo said.

Amadeo said the program is intended to help educate participants about both physical activity and nutritional habits.

“We hope that, in the four weeks of Step Into Fitness, the participants learn and start to see the benefits so that they will make physical activity a priority in life,” Amadeo said.  

The Step Into Fitness program is not all Recreational Sports offers faculty and staff.
Amadeo said a Recreational Sports membership can be purchased and paid for through payroll deduction. This membership includes all the group exercise classes and access to indoor tracks.

Faculty and staff also can make use of personal trainers, who do not require a membership.  

The last day to sign up for Step Into Fitness is June 30, via iurecsports.org.