Managing Stress for Health & Wellness

This "Managing Stress to be Healthy & Well" presentation offered by Campus Wellness and Changing Carolina Peer Educators teaches UNIV 101 students about the types and sources of stress, how stress affects their health (physically, mentally and emotionally) within the larger context of their life (academics, relationships, employment, etc.) and how they can address it in a healthy way. Activities and discussion help students identify personal sources of stress and examine how they tend to react to stress, learn skills/techniques for dealing with stress and indentify on-campus resources to help them cope with stress in a healthy way.

Learning Outcomes

The Campus Wellness Stress Management Presentation supports University 101 learning outcomes:

I. Foster Academic Success

e) Identify and apply strategies to effectively manage time and priorities.

III. Prepare Students for Responsible Lives in a Diverse, Interconnected, and Changing World

d) Describe processes, strategies, and resources, and explain the implications of their decisions , related to their overall wellness

• Define stress and understand the different ways stress can be conceptualized in their lives and for college students as a whole.
• Identify personal sources of stress and reflect upon how they manage and cope with their stress in healthy and unhealthy ways. Participate in group processing and discussion to become aware of similarities and differences among their peers.
• Identify at least 1 specific skill/resource/technique they can start using immediately to manage stress and better cope with daily hassles.
• Identify campus resources available to help students manage stress in a healthy way.

Program Description
This presentation is presented by Changing Carolina Peer Educators (undergraduate peer leaders) and Campus Wellness graduate assistants. All presenters are trained in knowledge, content and presentation skills by the Campus Wellness staff. The presentation consists of interactive large and small group activities and discussion.

The presentation consists of 7 sections:

1. Stress Scale Administration- Prior to the start of the presentation students fill out a stress scale developed by the USC Campus Wellness office. The scale helps students identify personal sources of stress, and the scale is used in subsequent activities and discussion.
   
   
2. Introduction & Body Outline Activity
   1. Introduction of Presenter
   2. Activity: Students draw (with crayons and markets) what stress looks like and feels like for them on a paper body outline in small groups.
   3. Groups present and discuss how their stress manifests physically, emotionally and mentally in them.
      
      
3. What is Stress and coping with Stress
   1. Discussion- definitions and models of stress, types of stress, affects of stress on health and daily functioning
      1. Physically: heart rate, blood pressure, weight gain/loss, chemical reactions, energy levels, appetite, sleep
      2. Mentally/Emotionally: anxiety/depression, irritability, forgetfulness, sadness, feeling frazzled/disorganized
   2. Activity: Stress Scale Review- In this activity, students get together in small groups and discuss their stressors and healthy and unhealthy ways of coping with their stressors.
   3. Groups share with each other the healthy and unhealthy ways students deal with stress – for each unhealthy behavior, students strategize a replacement that would be better for them.
   4. After group processing, students spend time individually reviewing their stressors and writing about what they can do to address their stressors in a healthy way.
      
      
4. Skill Development
   1. Relaxation Activity- The presenter leads the class in 1-2 types of self-relaxation activities (depending on time) that students can do on their own at home or in dorm rooms. Activities include guided visualization (body scan, progressive muscle relaxation), breathing exercises, self-massage techniques and restorative exercises (legs up the wall, supported relaxation positions). The specific activity depends on physical space of classroom, audience size and what students are interested in learning about. Handouts for how to do activities at home are provided (and associated USC resources for learning more)
   2. Time Management Activity: 24-hour time calendar activity… how do students currently (and REALLY) spend their time and how can they rearrange and prioritize activities.
      
      
5. Campus Resources
   1. Presenter briefly mentions campus resources available to students (handout distributed) and how to join Changing Carolina Peer Educators if students are interested in giving this presentation to others.
      
      
6. Conclusion
   1. Students participate in one last individuals processing activity where they identify and write down one thing they can do that day to start managing their own stress more effectively.
   2. Presenter evaluation

Follow Up Activities