Health Update: Spring Health Fair delivers commitment to student wellness – What Experts Say

As students look ahead to next year’s Student Involvement Fair for insight on clubs and activities, there will be an event dedicated to student wellbeing in the middle of the spring semester — the Spring Health Fair.

Under the theme “Wicked Wellness: Changes for Good,” in an effort to relate to current pop culture, the fair was held on Friday afternoon at Angela Athletic and Wellness Complex. The facility was fully renovated and developed a year before the fair started. The fair was established in 2019, according to Julie Schroeder-Biek, the College’s athletic director and co-chair of the Wellness Committee.

“I think it was when we first opened the building in 2018, we started this, and it has grown a lot since we’ve done that. We used to just do one big fair during the year, and now we do two. So it has really grown a lot,” Schroeder-Biek said.

The Student Wellness Advisory Committee supports student wellness initiatives at the College, which is sponsored by the Kristine Anderson Trustey Student Wellness Program, a former 1986 alumna. The goal of this program is to host two different events dedicated to health for students, including the Fall Flu Fest, which provides vaccinations to students, and the Spring Health Fair, where the program is overseen by Schroeder-Biek and Sarah Granger, director of the Health and Counseling Center.

The committee is based on the pillars of mind, body, spirit, emotional and financial health. SWAC, throughout the few years it has been established, has been able to expand upon these campus events. Schroeder-Biek shared that this new growth “has made the programming that much richer.”

Various student and South Bend organizations were also included in the annual health fair, which also comprised the Student Nurses Association, ATI Physical Therapy, the Sustainable Farm, 1st Source Bank, a drunk​ driving simulator from the Campus Security Department and the Family Justice Center of St. Joseph County. Chef Paru Pant provided a live cooking demonstration on making convenient overnight oats and chia puddings.

The Self Care Club was featured in the fair, a recently established club at the College supported by a grant from the Wellness Committee. It is focused on making self-care resources accessible and attainable to students through personal wellness events and giveaways, along with making the Health and Counseling Center more visible.

“Our main goal right now is just to keep focusing on giveaways, which we’ve done. Just to be something you can take home and do in your own time, so you can self-care while you’re juggling the issues of being a student,” club President junior Sofia Dahl-Santoro mentioned.

Tabling was held for Raise Your Voice, a sexual violence prevention and awareness initiative occurring on April 13, which gave students a preview of the programming of the event and what it typically features, alongside necessary resources. Junior Makenlie Hamlin, a Title IX student worker and member of the Committee on Sexual Violence Prevention, explained how the health fair provides the opportunity for students to further explore what’s available to them after spring break.

“The health fair highlights resources that students may hear of once in a while, but don’t necessarily know they have access to,” Hamlin stated. “And then I think for Raise Your Voice, just being there and making sure it’s not an intimidating conversation, and just by advocating and talking about these things and learning, you’re helping.”

Sophomore Allison Kinney, a nursing major, said she attended as part of her volunteering, where she provided vitals for students who were present.

“I love doing it because it’s like a little check-in for people and see how they’re doing, where they are at, and they get to learn a little bit more about themselves,” she said.

Committee member sophomore Arianna Vazquez shared that the security table was the most interesting to her due to the nature of the activity itself and what it taught her.

“I will say the security table, I think, was the most fun,” Vazquez said. “[It] teaches you just the valuable lesson of drinking and driving and just really reinforces it in a college setting.”

Schroeder-Biek hopes that more organizations can join the fair to expand and for students to be aware of the different health services surrounding them, whether from Saint Mary’s or the South Bend community.

“We really hope that students will see how important it is to take care of your health,” Schroeder-Biek said. “‘Wealth is health’ is on our board out there, and just seeing the resources that we have internally, but also seeing the resources that are in the local community for our students and really kind of guide them to those resources.”