Looking for a way to reward yourself with exercise can be tough. This can be answered with the Take the Stairs Challenge.

Creighton’s employee wellness program and facilities program are working together on a healthy culture promoting good health on campus for students and faculty by getting them more physically active. The program will run October 1 through October 31.

The program’s goal is to try to focus on getting people to take the stairs instead of the elevator. Wellness center Coordinator, Dawn Obermiller and other members of the center will be putting signs up near elevators and stair wells in Criss, Rigge, and Hixon Lied that have fun messages and facts. They will be repainting the walls and making sure there is good lighting. They will also be handing out magnets with the Take the Stairs logo on them to get people to recognize the program.

“Many people believe in going green and elevators use up a lot of unnecessary energy. I think if people know about that they would use the stairs more,” said Junior Nursing student, Annemarie Hengel.

Registration for the program is free and everyone will receive a log via email so you can keep track of all the flights of stairs you climb. When you sign up you will pick a group that you are in, for example, if you are a student you will pick the student group.

“The Taking The Stairs Challenge sounds like fun, and I actually sent an e-mail to my departmental colleagues encouraging participation,” said Department Chair of Communication Studies, Dr. Kirby.

The goal is to try to achieve buildings by the number of flights of stairs that you climb. There are a total of 1032 flights of stairs to try to complete in one month, a flight is considered 10-12 stairs.

“Once you accumulate the number of flights of stairs for one building you move onto the next one, this is to get people to think about being more physically active in their day,” Obermiller said.

The stairs do not just have to be on Creighton’s campus, you have use stairs from anywhere around Omaha. If you are at the park and there are stairs there they count towards the program.

“Taking the stairs is adding a little bit of extra exercise to your day. I think that it is a good program, it saves energy and helps people get exercise,” Hengel said.

At the end of the program Obermiller will add up all the flights of stairs and then divide that number by the number by the number of participants in the team to figure out who the winner is. The team that wins will get a free lunch provided by the Employee Wellness program. Students get the chance to participate in the drawings part of the program. They are entered to win gift cards to Scheels and other fun stuff.

“I teach aerobics three days a week, but still sometimes choose the elevator over the stairs and am hoping to break that bad habit. I definitely plan to participate!” Kirby said.

The employees get points towards their employee wellness program. The Employee Wellness Program is available to all of the people that work at Creighton; it is there to help them to get as healthy as possible. The points employees earn can be used in the SimplyWell program which is an online site where employees log on; the program will keep track of the points they earn. If they earn points they get to use those points as dollars at an online rewards store.

“It’s meant to encourage fun and camaraderie, and get people moving, that is just the main goal,” Obermiller said.

According to Obermiller there are almost 400 sign up for the challenge which is probably the most they have ever had in a challenge; 36 of them are students, 273 are staff and 84 are faculty.

39 percent of people use the elevator all the time, almost 20 percent of the people use the elevator 25 percent of less of the time. The goal is to get more people to use the elevator 25 percent of less of the time. The question will be asked again at the end of the program to see if the responses have changed from the first time the question was asked.

“It’s not just enough to get people to sign up; it’s to get people to finish. It’s cool to have the 400 but it depends on how many will actually finish. If we can get at least 50 percent of the people to finish the program that is a success, actually it is a success in the health promotion world,” Obermiller said.

Over time the program will have signs posted in Wareham Court in Skutt and also in the Harper Center, working to get the signs all over campus. The program is shorter because people tend to get bored and drop out when the wellness center does longer programs. Obermiller’s challenge is to get good participation as well as completion.

“It’s a supple program but it is a part of the whole initiative that we are trying to give a culture of health for the students as well as the employees. Hopefully we can have some fun,” Obermiller said.