The Women’s Active Living class at Edward Milne Community School is hoping residents will clean out their closets and donate much needed work out equipment to the program.
The program is designed for girls from Grades 9-12, who don’t enjoy participating in combative and competitive team sports. The class offers alternative forms of physical education like badminton, ultimate Frisbee, dance, kick boxing, bowling and aquafit.
“It’s a lot of girls who are self conscious, larger in weight, and you know, have never played any team sports,” said Kelly Hunter, senior physical education teacher. “It just provides the girls with an opportunity to understand there’s different ways of staying fit.”
The program is in its third year, and is mainly funded by a voluntary $30 fee from students.
“This is quite an initiative to get started and it costs a bit of money, and we’re trying to cut costs here,” she said. “Just to see if the community can come up with some equipment for us which would really benefit the girls.”
Item requested include yoga mats, steppers, two to five pound free weights and BOSU balls.
The course is held each semester, and students participate in an hour-long class every day during the school week. The program allows Grade 11 and 12 students to opt out of the regular physical education classes, and counts for credit towards the 120 hours of activity required for graduation.
“It is successful, there’s always a line up to get in and the girls enjoy it,” Hunter said.