Fit & Healthy During After-School

Description

With its strong community presence and commitment to wellness, the YMCA of Metropolitan Denver is an ideal partner for the Colorado Action for Healthy Kids team, and a great example of how a Y and Action for Healthy Kids team can work together. The collaboration in Denver brought Action for Healthy Kids’ program, ReCharge! Energizing After-School, to 21 after-school sites being run by the YMCA. However, it was much more than that as the organizations shared resources and jointly tackled the challenge of launching and running an after-school program with a goal of helping kids be healthier.

The positive experience for both groups demonstrates that collaboration leverages the strengths of organizations. The Colorado Action for Healthy Kids team utilized The Y’s Way to Physical Fitness as a complement to ReCharge!, and YMCA staff facilitated program training and implementation. The Y also helped promote the program through its communications channels to schools, parents and community sites. Says Colorado Action for Healthy Kids team member Tami Anderson, “The YMCA of Metropolitan Denver had a mandate to become involved in the childhood obesity issue, so ReCharge! was naturally appealing to the organization.”

Kimberley Armitage, executive director of the Aurora Family YMCA agrees. “It was surprisingly easy to launch ReCharge!, primarily because we had everything in place, including after-school staff…but the biggest measure of success is that kids really enjoyed it. It’s so great to see kids in an after-school setting eating a snack that you know is totally healthy, and being active in constructive, fitness-enhancing ways.“