UMPD Officer Challenges Coworkers to Lose Big

For the past five years Katie Seitz has made campus a safer place through her work as an officer with the University of Minnesota Police Department (UMPD). Now she's hoping to make it a healthier place by launching the UMPD Biggest Loser weight-loss competition.

Seitz modeled the competition on the Biggest Loser television show in which teams compete to drop the largest percentage of body weight. For the UMPD game, each participant pays $25 toward a kitty to be awarded to the winning individual and team. Winnings could be big, considering that the four-month competition is open to some 45 officers as well as other UMPD workers.

Obesity in the police force is a subject that Seitz has studied as a student in the Public Health Certificate in Core Concepts program. Designed for working professionals, most of the program's coursework is online.

"I love the flexibility," says Seitz, who works the nightshift. "I can do schoolwork on my own time."

After getting her certificate this spring, Seitz plans to apply her credits toward a Master of Public Health. Working on the certificate has shown her the valuable connections between police work and public health.

"When I first started my coursework, I had no idea of the strong correlation between law enforcement and public health," says Seitz, who cites mental health, suicide, homelessness, and alcohol use as some of the shared issues. "The things I learn in school relate to what I see on the job."