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EVANSVILLE, Ind. — It's pretty much like any typical group exercise class you'd find at a gym.

Instructors guide the class through various exercises. There's upbeat music and positive vibes, and colorful dumbbells dot the room.

But there's one key difference.

All the participants in ACErcise, part of a student-run pro bono physical therapy program at the University of Evansville called Ace CARE, have neurologic conditions that make safe and effective exercise difficult on their own.

Each participant is matched with students who tailor workout routines, ensure safety and forge friendships.

'I think there's an endless list of benefits (the participants) get from this,' said Kourtney Bunselmeyer, a third-year student in UE's doctor of physical therapy program and co-coordinator of the ACErcise program.

'We've seen a lot of improvements with confidence with walking, with balance, reducing falls,' she added.

The class, which meets two evenings a week, starts with a warm-up period. Following an approach called 'Big and Loud,' the warm-ups encourage participants to shout and make large physical movements. It's designed to counter the speech and physical impairments brought about by progressive neurologic conditions like Parkinson's disease.

The class then moves into endurance exercises, followed by strength and balance training.

'This could be a group class doing step aerobics, or today we have a circuit so they're working around different stations, working on different exercises,' Bunselmeyer said. 'All of the students that they're paired with modify the exercises in different ways to individualize it to each person.'

The night ends with a game, a participant favorite. The fun brings many of them back each week.

'They motivate me to walk because I feel like I'm going to fall,' said Kathy McMurray, who's in her second semester in the program. 'There's never a risk of that here, so it's a good opportunity to come get good exercise.'

McMurray said it also allows her to teach the students about Parkinson's.

James A Kemp, also in his second semester, said the workout allows him to maintain the physical skills at the level they were at before his own Parkinson's diagnosis. He said Evansville is a good community for opportunities like that because various gyms also offer similar services.

'Every one of them is a little bit different,' he said of the classes. 'Each one of these stretches your abilities.'

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Rewiring the brain

The idea behind ACErcise is to elevate participants' heart rates.

It's important to their health, said Mary Kessler, dean of the UE's College of Education and Health Sciences, but can be difficult to do in their day-to-day lives.

'Research shows that if you're able to exercise at those higher levels, you have a greater opportunity for neuroplastic change, which means just some improvement in your nervous system function,' Kessler said.

Neuroplasticity is the brain's ability to rewire itself after injury.

'Our brain's pretty awesome,' Bunselmeyer said. 'It is able to change, so just because someone has a stroke and something's damaged, neuroplasticity is basically able to regenerate that and gain motor neurons.'

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A decade of caring

ACErcise is one of three programs in Ace CARE, which is run entirely by students in UE's physical therapy program.

Kessler said the idea for the clinic really came from those students themselves about 10 years ago.

'They came to me,' said Kessler, who was chair of the physical therapy department at the time, 'with this idea that they really wanted to take what they were learning in class and what they had practiced and done in their summer clinical experiences, and use that to help our community.

'They felt very strongly that there was an unmet need in our community for physical therapy services, and really that's the genesis of where it began,' she added.

Kessler said UE was one of the first five schools in the country to host a pro bono physical therapy clinic, and since 2010, Ace CARE has grown into three different service lines.

One is ACErcise. The others are Ace Buddies, a similar group exercise class for children with neurologic conditions, and the Ace+PT, a traditional outpatient physical therapy clinic with patients being referred there by physicians at partner organizations. The three programs combined lead to about 1,100 'encounters' with community members each year.

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Kessler said around 85 to 90 percent of the school's physical therapy students participate in one of those three service lines. Students in athletic training and physician assistant programs have also started to get involved.

'If you didn't participate in Ace CARE, you were the outcast because everyone did it,' Bunselmeyer said of her first year in the physical therapy program. It was just a given, she added. If a student goes to UE, they volunteer with Ace CARE.

The program runs on volunteers and falls outside the scope of UE's curriculum, unlike at some other schools where involvement in their own pro bono clinics is required. Students typically get started in their first year of physical therapy school. Students in their second and third years serve as mentors.

Ace CARE's board is also composed of students. Kessler said it gives them the opportunity to learn what it's like to run a clinic while also teaching them fundraising and risk management skills.

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The programs come at no cost to patients and participants and, aside from some support from the university, rely on philanthropy. Ace CARE recently bought a passenger van, which Kessler said should bring participants to campus who can't arrange their own transportation starting next semester.

Kessler said she's heard from students who decided to come to UE because of Ace CARE, and graduates often refer to it as a transformative aspect of their time at the school.

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'I thought it was really cool that it was implemented into our culture,' Bunselmeyer said. 'It's just what we do, and everyone's involved in it in some way.'

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This article originally appeared on Evansville Courier & Press: UE's ACErcise gives those with neurologic conditions a good workout