With the end of February, came the end of “Power Week”, one aspect of the “PowerUp” campaign created by our Public Relations and Advertising students for the Bateman Competition, in partnership with the PRSSA.  Although they’ve had to take their blog down (in accordance with the competition rules), you can still catch up on what they worked on thanks to team member Kendal Valenstein!  -JP

Guest Author Kendal Valenstein (PR/A)


 

Five days and 54 kids later, the 2012 Chapman University Bateman Competition Team wrapped up power week at the Morningside Elementary site of the Boys and Girls Club of Garden Grove afterschool program. Power Week was part of our team’s larger program called Power Up! which was designed to tackle the childhood obesity epidemic and put a fun spin on healthy eating and exercise.

PowerUp PRSSA Program


Our goal was to make a lasting impact on the kids through fun activities, special guests, and health education. Whether the kids were jumping rope for the American Heart Association, taste testing the hummus that our guest chef from Sapphire Laguna prepared, or scrimmaging against each other in a game of soccer with the Chapman University women’s soccer team, the smiles on their faces assured us that we had a successful program on our hands. Every day the staff would tell us stories about how the kids would be reciting the Power Up! cheer during recess and that parents were coming up to them to learn more about our program, giving us further cause to believe that we had created change in the lives of these children.

The positive feedback we received was so gratifying but the greatest gift was to quiz the kids at the end of the week’s activities and find that the kids remembered everything we taught them. From knowing what food group a tomato is in to knowing how many minutes they should exercise a day, it was apparent that the message had sunk in. When it came time to leave, we handed them all their certificates of completion and in return we were given personal thank you notes from each of them as well as a ton of hugs. We are definitely going to miss the kids at Morningside Elementary but we hope they continue to Power Up!

–
Kendal Valenstein