Environmental, art, investment, and crochet: four words and four titles of some of the many clubs at FHC. Each of these clubs has a name that is self-explanatory, and for that reason, they are often easy to decide on. One club that struggled to choose a name, though, was the Walking Club.

The founders of this club, including junior Gigi Sinicrope, had another name picked out before they decided on the Walking Club.

“We initially wanted to call it the Hot Girls Walking Club,” Gigi said. “That was the initial intent, but we thought that might be a little inappropriate for a school club. We decided to call it the Walking Club instead, and [Hot Girls Walking] is kind of the nickname.”

The Walking club will focus on taking walks in nature and staying healthy while also connecting with classmates.

Although the club is very new and there are not many members currently, the founders—Gigi and her fellow juniors, Hailey Miller, Sophia Erbentraut, and Bryn Pennington—are hoping to promote it through social media.

“I think we are going to make an Instagram for the club,” Gigi said. “We will try to get our friends [to join] and see if they can get other people. Sophia is in FX, so we might try to make a video to tell people that it’s happening.”

Hopefully, this promotion plan is successful because the club is very beneficial. Not only are walks, especially ones outdoors, healthy both physically and mentally, but the girls are planning walks in several stunning parks throughout Cascade and Ada.

Gigi said that they may include Peace Park and Cascade Burton Park; both offer beautiful views of nature throughout the local area which members may not see otherwise. Furthermore, the club may include themes at each meeting, which will be another aspect to entice new members.

Since the club is so new, there are no set meeting dates yet. However, Gigi believes that Sunday is the best day to hold the club because there are no sports practices that day, and she thinks that many of their members may be athletes.

“I think that [the club] will mostly just be girls,” Gigi said, “probably because it was girls who started it. I don’t know too many guys who have an interest in going on walks. But, [it will] be people who want to get active and maybe athletes who are in season and don’t want to do an intense workout on the weekend.”

Although the club may draw athletes, it will also draw many other people as the founders are hoping. Hailey believes that this is an added benefit of the club.

“[I think] this club will be really fun,” Hailey said. “You get to be healthy by going outside and walking, and it’s also an opportunity to hang out with your friends or even new people that you don’t normally interact with.”

The ease of the Walking Club’s main activity will hopefully be a draw for new members. One of the reasons that the founders chose to form a walking club is because no skill is necessary to participate.

Not only is the club unique because of its universal draw, but it is also unique because of its unorthodox creation.

“It kind of [started] as a joke,” Hailey said. “We all wanted to start a club to make it look good on our college resumes. But, once we started talking about it, and the Walking Club idea originated from the “Hot Girl Walks” trend on TikTok, we became more serious.”

A joke, a plan for the future, and a TikTok trend. This is the perfect recipe for a successful club, but one thing is missing. At FHC, every club needs a teacher to support it. In this case, it was physical education teacher Stacy Steensma.

The final step in creating the Walking Club was convincing Steensma to support it. This task was not very difficult, though, as the club includes two of her favorite things: health and community.

“I think that the club will be a success,” Steensma said. “I think it’s a good idea to call it a walking club, but I think it’s also a wellness club, so walking is just part of it. I also think the girls want to get people together that typically don’t hang out together.”

Not only will the club include walking, but it may also include other physical activities. Steensma, as a P.E. teacher, hopes that it may feature other activities such as yoga.

The new Walking Club is the perfect way to get physical exercise and improve mental and physical health while enjoying nature and spending time with classmates.

“[Benefits of the club] are getting outside, getting exercise, and even trying new things,” Steensma said. “The girls are going to maybe do yoga and other forms of exercise as well as walking. So, the benefits include being exposed to different people and different ways to move your body.”