If walk around your neighborhood, you might be hard pressed to find children running or riding bikes like we did when we were kids. Physical activity-based games have been replaced by video games, ipods and social networking websites, and the results have not been flattering.
In 2008 – at the urging of Western Kentucky University’s track coach, Erick Jenkins – Light of Chance Founder, Eric Logan toyed with the idea of adding a wellness program to his already multifaceted nonprofit organization. The idea seemed like the perfect addition to his thriving, community-focused organization, however, Logan found himself a bit too busy with Light of Chance’s other programs. Organizing the annual Dust Bowl, Save the Dream Credit and Debt Management Program and Aspire proved to be too demanding at the time. Thus, the wellness program would have to sit on the shelf.
Fast forward a year: Logan found himself becoming increasingly more motivated to bring the program to life, after discovering that childhood obesity was a huge epidemic in America, and that Kentucky was ranked third. He was then propelled to set his plan into motion, resulting inGet Set Go, a free, fun and comprehensive health initiative that encourages youth, grades K-8, to become more active and healthy through nutrition and physical activity. Get Set Go strives to increase youth physical activity and show them how to make healthier eating choices in their existing environment.
Logan successfully launched the pilot program for Get Set Go at Western Kentucky University in 2010. In 2011, he partnered with the Boys and Girls Club to provide Get Set Go during its program on Mondays and Wednesdays and with Bowling Green Parks and Recreation on Thursdays, servicing over 150 children weekly. WKU’s Exercise Science Club, the Finish Line Youth Foundation and the Barren River District Health Department all are partners in the program.
With Get Set Go, children participate in both traditional and nontraditional physical exercises such as zumba, aerobics, kicking, dance and yoga. They also learn new and healthier ways to eat and prepare food. Logan would like to see Get Set Go change lives and dispel myths that healthy foods cannot also be tasty.
“We listen to what the kids want,” Logan says. “We try not to make it like school. We make it real interactive.”
“I’m learning with the kids,” he continues. “We’re learning and growing together.”
Well said.
By: Shawn Whitsell
Article featured in Bowling Green Parent Magazine’s April/May/June Issue