At least 10 years have passed from the first time that Memorial administrators gathered to talk about the concept of a "healthy community" until the opening of HealthWorks! Kids' Museum. The creation of the museum itself had occupied a little over three years and it is, even now, only just leaving the dock. Memorial's hope is that they have built something that will accomplish all of its goals, but they are mindful of the fact that there will be unexpected leaks, rough seas and the occasional pirate ship on the horizon.

Memorial discovered that the present facilities for ambulatory rehabilitation and the health and fitness club were too small and too spread out to properly serve their growing client base. To remedy this situation, they decided to build a facility which would encompass both of these programs in a central location in downtown South Bend, Indiana.

Memorial's desire to engage a broad range of community members, beyond just those using the fitness or rehabilitation centers, made them first consider the addition of a community room in the Memorial Leighton HealthPlex. After a visit to a children's health center, one of the Vice Presidents suggested transforming the concept of a simple community room into a children's health learning center. As further research and investigation took place the idea grew into an innovative, interactive learning environment occupying the entire second floor of Memorial's newest building. This museum would be a great, new kind of resource for "creating healthier communities."

Memorial embarked on a series of focus groups, site visits and conversations with experts from the worlds of education, technology, entertainment, psychology, museum design, health and medicine with a goal of creating the best, most audacious facility possible. To this end they hired a design team, organized local committees to represent the stakeholders and went to work deciding what it was they wanted to teach and how they planned to do it. Memorial's overarching theme instructed children that the health choices they make today have significant consequences for them tomorrow.

As the curriculum group developed experiential and educational goals for the facility the designers, Jeff Kennedy and Associates, were at work creating several documents which drew sample exhibits from other children's museums in the United States and Ontario, Canada. Through a lengthy process of video conferences, phone calls and in-person meetings they created a final list of exhibit components and a floor plan for the new facility which they subsequently named HealthWorks! Kids' Museum. HealthWorks! would include a theater (The Main Brain), three exhibit floor thematic zones (MindWorks!, BodyWorks! and All About Me!), a resource center, offices and two classrooms.

It was extremely important that the classroom spaces be as innovative and exciting as the exhibit floor. To assist in this, planners equipped them with large, attractive props, state-of-the-art technology and media equipment and simple and direct items like "write-on-the-walls" poster-friendly wall coverings. The classrooms were also designed to be flexible, not only to suit a variety of HealthWorks! programming, but also to accommodate usage by other outside groups in the evening hours.

The creation of the physical spaces depended on the expertise and proficiency of the designers and various contractors and sub-contractors. In the creation of HealthWorks! they called upon traditional construction interests- architects, plumbers, carpenters, etc.- as well as creative software developers, museum exhibit fabricators, graphic and interior designers and even a company whose main product is the construction of athletic climbing walls. Clear communication and well orchestrated coordination were vitally important during the building stage.

Memorial recognized that building and equipping this children's museum was one step in the process. The next step was to bring educators and staff together to implement the mission: to engage children in discovering and embarking upon lifelong journeys of healthy living. Capitalizing on HealthWorks! fun and innovation, they crafted job descriptions that were anything but ordinary. The director would be the Visionary Potentiator of Pumped-up Kids, the education director would be a High-Flying Kid Motivator and the media/technology needs would be met by the in-house Techno-Wizard. Initial plans were for a small additional staff of three part-time and one more full-time employee and a group of either contracted individuals or Memorial staff members serving as classroom teachers.

Most amazing in this process was the overwhelmingly positive reaction. Some members of the community focus groups came forward, members of the Junior League for example, offering both staffing and financial assistance. Others would later step forward or be reached by Memorial's Foundation staff. This campaign utilized a multi-pronged approach including traditional foundation routes, one-on-one meetings with identified community supporters as well as making contact with individuals and organizations outside Memorial's traditional region.

During this period an Evaluation Design Team came together to discuss how to go beyond kids (at the museum) to the people who are their primary teachers and role models, and to systems that intersect with kids in the many facets of their lives. The overlapping of child, community and museum would form a major component of the evaluation design. The group developed a three sphere model as a graphic illustration of the concept. Memorial asked themselves, "What is it that this new facility has to offer the community?" This idea of measuring what matters most became a slogan for the Evaluation Design Team: We measure what we value. We value what we measure.

As the opening day drew near, the Memorial team found themselves in a process of finalizing and refining. While many people's work would be completed when the doors of HealthWorks! Kids' Museum opened, implementing the healthy community mission would be just beginning. To reach these goals Memorial selected key staff members and developed a volunteer structure. They had been fortunate that some of the early committee members and their organizations had long ago pledged volunteer support for the venture.

What began as broad conversations about educational goals later became lesson plans and blueprints for necessary classroom props. The HealthWorks! team created materials to explain the links between the curriculum and several state health education models, and determined contents for pre- and post-visit mailings.

Plans were also made for what would happen on a daily visit to the center. Admission cost, visitation scheduling, confirmation and conduct were determined while the marketing and publicity were reaching the wider community. Some of the marketing utilized a "sneak peek" approach, highlighting the arrival of individual exhibits and their installation onto the exhibit floor. With all of the elements finally together they were ready for opening day.