Exercise Science Students Raise Awareness about Cardiovascular Disease

As part of the Kinesiology and Recreation (KNR) 307, Exercise in Health and Disease course, students participate in a project to raise awareness about cardiovascular disease to peers and family and friends, and raise funds for the American Heart Association's (AHA) annual American Heart Walk.

This year, the class will be participating in three team fund raising activities, in addition to their own individual fundraising activities (each student is asked to seek donations of at least $100 for the AHA).

The team activities are as follows:

• Heart Healthy Bake Sales
  Students prepare heart healthy recipes from AHA cookbooks, and sell them on 3 different dates. There are also raffles for AHA cookbooks.
  
• Physical Activities on the Quad
  This team promotes physical activity by hosting a physical activity event on the Quad. Activities include: bocce ball, ladder golf, and bags. Participants are entered in a raffle for prizes.
  
• The signature event is the "Red Dress Campaign"
  For this event, we convince five of our male faculty to "compete" to wear a red dress for a day. Students and faculty can "vote" for the male professor they would like to see in a red dress. The professor with the most votes (money) "wins." Then, students and faculty donate to see how long and with what the "winner" gets to wear the red dress. For each $50, the professor wears the dress for one hour. So, for $400, he gets an 8 hour day. Above and beyond $400 buys accessories, such as hose, heels, wig, make-up, etc. Individuals place their votes in collection containers that are located in both the Horton and McCormick main offices. The professorsl also have their own cans that people can place donations in.
  
  The purpose of the red dress is to raise awareness of the #1 killer of women - cardiovascular disease. The AHA has the "Go Red for Women" campaign, and this is a shoot off of that.
  
  Each student developed educational flyers that are placed around campus to educate the campus community about different risk factors. In addition to participating in the walk, the students host a table at the Heart Walk where they hand out information on heart health.

Again this year (2006) the students raised close to $4500! The project had a deep impact on the class and on the students individually.