Malley Offers Free Fitness Classes

Students no longer need to pay to get their sweat onSasha ToddThe Santa ClaraSeptember 20, 2018This year all fitness classes at the Pat Malley Fitness and Recreation Center are free for students.Up until this fall, Malley charged gym members $7 for each individual class and $30 to buy a pack of nine classes.For some Santa Clara students, paying for fitness classes was considered a luxury as the costs could quickly add up to as much as $100 per quarter.“I’ve never taken a Malley fitness class before, but a friend just told me that they are offering them for free all year,” said junior Stacey Odo. “That will encourage me to take a class.”According to the Campus Recreation website, there will be 22 classes offered each week this quarter.These include, but are not limited to, Vinyasa flow yoga, cardio sculpt fusion, kickboxing, barre and cycling.Faculty, staff and other non-students are still required to pay the $7 per-class fee or purchase the alternative package.Janice DeMonsi, Director of Recreation, explained that the university is able to offer the free classes through recent donations.“Funding for these classes are coming from various parents’ generous donations for mental health,” DeMonsi said. “We know that physical activity helps with mental health, anxiety and stress.”DeMonsi was unable to disclose the amount of the donation or the families who behind the donation.She did however explain that last fall, when Malley offered one free class each week on Wednesdays, data showed an enormous spike in enrollment in the free classes compared to those classes that required payment.This obvious preference for free classes is why Malley officials began to seek ways to offer classes free of charge all year.Malley Center is already expecting a substantial increase in student fitness class participation.“The buzz around the fitness classes has been huge,” DeMonsi said. “I think we have already had over two hundred students pick up their passes. We’ve ordered two thousand passes. I have a feeling we will need to order more.”This past summer, Malley charged students a one-time summer membership fee of $105, with the intention to generate more revenue for the campus recreation program.According to an article published by The Santa Clara in April 2018, other summer membership fee revenue is intended to go towards intramural championship shirts, resurfacing the basketball courts, replacing tables and the wireless Bellomy Field scoreboard.In previous summers, Santa Clara students had free access to the gym facilities.Along with the free fitness classes being offered throuhgout the school year, Malley also plans to install new workout equipment from the revenue that was acquired from students’ summer membership fees.The equipment includes two new step mills and new bikes.Contact Sasha Todd at atodd@scu.edu or call (408) 554-4852.