Almanac

Ask Bucky

Ask Bucky is a service provided by Visitor and Information Programs. For more information, call 263-2400, visit the Campus Information Center in the Red Gym or the new Welcome Center, 21 N. Park St., or visit us at http://www.vip.wisc.edu. Below are two questions Ask Bucky recently answered.

Q: Do you remember that painted gray and red crosswalk on the road between Van Hise and Ingraham Hall? I was so disappointed when they blacktopped over it. Who painted that there, and who can I talk to about getting it back there during the spring semester?

A: According to Facilities Planning and Management, a contractor not associated with the university was responsible for designing and painting the Bucky crosswalk. The reason that it was covered with blacktop was because the paint was unable to withstand the heavy foot traffic. They attempted to repair it, but found that it continued to fade. It was decided that the most practical thing to do was blacktop over it.

Q: I know people often say Madison is a large university, but how large is it? What is the physical size of our campus and how many people attend the university?

A: The main campus is 933 acres. There are 41,466 total students currently enrolled, including 28,462 undergraduates. To learn more interesting facts about our university, visit the UW–Madison facts Web site, http://www.wisc.edu/about/facts.

Lighten Up Wisconsin open to faculty, staff

Was losing weight or exercising more part of your New Year’s resolutions? For members of the UW–Madison faculty and staff, achieving these goals has never been easier.

UW–Madison is encouraging faculty, staff and students to participate in Lighten Up Wisconsin, a four-month challenge that supports teams in making “small, realistic and permanent changes” in members’ lifestyles to encourage healthier living.

“We’re going to try exercising together during lunch,” says Ann Hebl, a team leader in the Office of Admissions, one of the many departments that will participate in the program. “Our teams are hoping to become healthier by changing our eating habits and increasing how often we exercise.”

Lighten Up Wisconsin offers weekly exercise and nutrition tips, healthful recipes, periodic challenges and a handbook filled with healthy eating and exercise ideas, while also encouraging members to make healthy decisions through friendly competition with others and personal goal-setting. Teams of 10 or fewer participants compete to lose the most weight or to reach the highest amount of accumulated activity among other teams in the state. Although the competition officially started on Jan. 15, teams can register until March 15.

For three years, the challenge has been helping participants get healthier around Wisconsin, but this is the first year UW–Madison has participated. In 2006, the program encouraged participants to lose 18,000 pounds and log more than 371,000 miles of activity.

“UW–Madison is such a huge part of the community and people really look to the campus as part of what is going on in the city as a whole,” says Jordan Bingham, the coordinator of Lighten Up Wisconsin. “If the campus can take on a wellness program like this and can make small changes in eating habits and exercise, it can be a really great example for the rest of the state.”

For more information, visit Lighten Up Wisconsin.