Starting March 1, 2026, a group of Colby College students began hosting practice for the Waterville, Maine, chapter of Run Your City. The program’s mission is to provide a free running program for kids in kindergarten through eighth grade.
Cleo Rehkopf `28, who is a part of the chapter’s leadership team, explains how the program gives kids the opportunity to run “for fun for free” with college students who like to run. The program, says Rehkopf, is “not about having them run faster, but just to get them out.”
The idea to start the program in Waterville came from Kate McBride `28. She heard about the program from friends who run for Boston University’s cross country team and are a part of the BU chapter of Run Your City. McBride then learned a little bit more about what the program was and thought, “Like, wow, that’s so cool. I wonder if we could do that at Colby.”
McBride was then connected with somebody who works at Run Your City to talk about “what it would look like and how [the chapter] would get started.” McBride was told to “start with getting a leadership team,” so she reached out to Norah Mills `28 to become a co-president. McBride mentioned that they then “wanted to get some guys involved, too.” As Will Eckes `28 was helping a lot with recruiting volunteers, McBride and Mills recruited Eckes to join them as a co-president.
To get the chapter running, the students at the College leading the chapter did “a lot of work with the national organization to get [them] off the ground and running.” Rehkopf “[reached out] to local schools and emailed principals from local schools, teachers, people who work there, and the Children’s Discovery Center,” through which she recalls getting a lot of participants. Rehkopf initially worried that they “wouldn’t get anyone,” but she has fortunately found that a lot of kids “were super excited” to sign up.
Mills said one of their hopes of running this chapter is “to get Colby students more connected with the broader Waterville community.”
Rehkopf added, “We just want to not be intimidating to people in the broader area.” She hopes to help kids in the local community have a fun time.
The Waterville chapter had a good turnout at their first practice on March 1, 2026, where 57 kids were signed up. Still, looking to the future, Rehkopf mentioned that one of their goals is “to keep getting more kids.” Rehkopf said, “next time we hope to be more methodical, getting more kids from all the schools around here.”
When asked what has been the most fun part of this program so far, Mills said, “The first practice was very rewarding. Obviously everyone came in, we got into a stretch in a circle, and I was like ‘Alright, this is actually happening. This is fun.’ ”
For Rehkopf, the most fun part has been “seeing how much the kids like to run.” She continued, “I feel like that was the best surprise. I’m used to working with kids and trying to teach them stuff, and sometimes they are excited, but more often they are pretty resistant. I was expecting the kids to be like that with running, but they just came in with so much energy.”
The kids seem to be having a fun time with the Colby College students running the chapter, as Mills said, “We have seven year olds who say, ‘We want to run more laps!’ ” With motivated participants and a good group of students at the College running the program, the Waterville Run Your City chapter is off to a good start, with the future of the program looking optimistic.
~ Haley Hegarty `28
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