Lovett Healthy Lifestyle Club

"It is not about the number of people, but the impact that you make."

Background Information

Atlanta, Georgia is a diverse city with more opportunities than you can even imagine. The community that Lily lives in, is filled with ways to live a healthy lifestyle, but everyday she sees teens in her community making the unhealthy choice, when the healthy one is right in front of their faces. Lily used to be one of those teens, who would always opt for the sugary snack instead of the healthy vegetable or fruit. She was also the teen who complained about going to workout with her mom, and hated school organized workouts. As much as her parents would tell her that she needed to be watching what she was eating and make better fitness choices, she refused to listen.

All of this changed, though when she went to Chile and gorged herself on sugar, carbs, and everything in between. There was no one to tell her to stop, so she just kept going and going until one day she realized how unhealthy she had become. Lily had an epiphany. Something had to be done. She eliminated most of the sugar and simple carbs in her diet, and started focusing on eating her fruits and veggies. She also researched ton of yummy, healthy recipes. To her surprise, eating healthier wasn’t that hard. She soon started working out more often as well, and within a few weeks was feeling much healthier and happier.

When it came time to think of a way that she wanted to benefit her community, the answer was simple. So many of the teens in her community are missing out on all of the ways that they can be healthy in their day to day lives, and she wants to educate them on how easy and fun it can be to make those healthy choices. The Lovett/ Buckhead community is a community that Lily cares deeply about, and she desperately wants to share what she has learned with her peers in the community. Lily hopes by the time she has completed her project that the teens in her community will be making healthier choices, and will want to be active whenever they can!

“Health and nutrition had always been apart of my life, and it was so rewarding to be able to take something so big in my life and share it with people who also had an appreciation, and with people who wanted to learn more about it.”
– Lily

Implementation of Project

Lily started working on her project in September of 2015. She first started by showing a video to her school about the club in order to get people interested and excited. After the informational meeting Lily and her co-leader, Caroline, held a sign up meeting. At the sign up meeting there were snacks available, and 30 people signed up for the club! Planning the action day was the hardest part of the project for Lily. She met with Caroline multiple times during lunch, and they decided that on the action day they would have a trail mix bar and would do yoga. The time to have the action day was difficult because they had to make sure that it coordinated with her, Caroline, and the club sponsor, Mrs. Mitchell’s, schedules. The action day ended up taking place on October 26th. Though only 5 people ended upcoming, there were people present from 3 grade levels, and that made Lily really happy. Everyone one had a lot of fun, and Lily thought that she had been very successful.

“I was at first worried when only five people showed up for the action day, but I soon learned that it is not about the number of people, but the impact that you make.”
– Lily

Results of Project

In the end, Lily was very happy with the results of her CLP. She had 30 people sign up for the club, and and on the action day there were freshmen, sophomores, and juniors present at the meeting, which showed that Lily did a good job at getting the word out about the club. There were 3 main people who really contributed to the creation of the club and the action day.  Those people were Lily, her friend Caroline, and the club sponsor, Mrs. Mitchell. Together they put in approximately 20 hours into the creation on the action day. The action day was really successful in that everyone seemed to be having a lots of fun, and all of the club members helped contribute ideas on what to do in the next club meetings.

“It was so rewarding to see what I had learned from Alzar School come to life. I was so happy with what I accomplished with my action day, and think that everyone had a great time!”
– Lily

What’s Next

In the future Lily plans to use her leadership skills in many aspects of her life. She is currently helping lead a bible study for 6th grade girls that meets every Tuesday. Also she is currently helping to lead a research project about the reproduction of clownfish for her marine biology class. In the future Lily hopes to help lead her peers through the woods, on their up coming Junior Outdoor Experience, also Lily is planning on doing training with her marine biology teacher so that she can help clean and care for the tanks on the weekends, and during the summer. Now that Lily’s action day is complete, she plans to continue holding regular meetings with her Healthy Lifestyle Club through out the rest of the year, and will possibly continue the club in her senior year.

“From doing this project I am so much more confident in my abilities to organize a group of people, in order to make a difference.”
– Lily