Author: Tara Duty
Planning Unit: Mercer County CES
Major Program: Active Living and Health Promotions General
Plan of Work: Family Resilience and Skill Building
Outcome: Initial Outcome
Mercer County Extension Agent for Family and Consumer Sciences offered a newsletter based walking program designed for individuals who have not previously been physically active or who have not been physically active in a long time. There were 8 participants and 75% of participants increased the amount of walking that they did on a weekly basis. 100% of participants examined ways to set goals for walking. The Agent adapted this newsletter based program into a weekly walk at the local extension office. The group walked together for the allotted amount of time 1x per week for accountability purposes, read and discussed the newsletter together and shared encouraging words/tips and tricks to keep going each week. 2 participants in particular stood out, 1 had just recovered from a fall which broke their arm and we worked closely on their stride and picking up their feet while looking forward and engaging their core to help stabilize them while they walked. The other participant that stood out had just found out they were in remission after fighting lung cancer. Neither of these participants missed a weekly walk at the extension office. Additionally, the agent shared SNAP recipes and hosted a demonstration of 1 recipe at each weekly meeting. A follow up evaluation revealed that 50% of participants are still engaging in weekly physical activity and 100% of participants are looking forward to starting a weekly walking club at the Extension Office.
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