Campus Life

More than 165 teams decide 'Walking Works'

More than 165 teams of Penn State Hershey Medical Center and Penn State College of Medicine employees and their family members have already registered to particpate in Walking Works. Walking Works is a free event to promote physical activity and healthy eating in the medical center and College of Medicine community. People can participate as individuals, as members of a team or both.

Team registration for Walking Works opened Thursday and individual registration for the program also is under way. Only employees can register as an individual.

Medical center employees participating to earn wellness points towards their Health Reimbursement Arrangement (HRA) must sign up as an individual and complete steps one and two of the registration process.

College of Medicine employees and medical center employees not participating in the medical center health-care benefits plan do not have HRA's and therefore do not earn wellness points, but they can participate in Walking Works. Spouses or family members also can participate as part of a team, but cannot sign up as an individual to earn wellness points or to track their individual steps.

All medical center employee participants who did not register as "self-reported exercisers" on their Health Compass during benefits open enrollment who successfully complete Walking Works and who have logged their steps/activity onto the tracking tool, will receive wellness points into their Wellness Points Account to be converted to dollars in their HRA account in 2007.

Beginning on week five of the challenge (March 25), a participant will need to log 5,000 or more steps per day on five or more days of the week to successfully complete Walking Works.

All physical activity counts, not just walking. Capital Blue Cross has an online a minutes-to-steps conversion tool to account for activity when someone is not wearing a step counter, or when the activity is something other than walking.

A Walking Works kickoff event is scheduled for 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Friday, Feb. 24, in the medical center's hospital anteroom. Free step-counters will be available for team captains to pick up. At 12:15 p.m. meet at the flagpole on the front lawn of the medical center for a kick-off walk.

For more information, visit http://www.pennstatewalkingworks.com online.

Last Updated March 19, 2009

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