Interested in living a long, healthy, and happy life? FCC’s Wellness Week – celebrated every semester – will start Oct. 17 through the 21. It is a great opportunity for students to learn how to incorporate the Eight Dimensions of Wellness into their daily life.
The FCC will provide a wide range of events and activities all during the week to help students find resources that address emotional, social, physical, and financial wellness.
Kicking off wellness week with two events on Monday Oct. 17 there is the Health T-Shirt Picture, where students may grab a free t-shirt and take a group photo at noon in the cafe. This is being done to fight the stigma associated with mental health issues that are prevalent not only on campus, but in general. Bystander Intervention Training will take place on the conference center presented by Heartly House, an organization in the community that provides a lot of different services for victims of sexual assault and domestic violence.
Bystender Intervention goes back to the 60 was created in reference to the gruesome murder of Kitty Genovese in 1964, which was saw or heard by 38 spectators, but who chose not to interfere or notify the police because they thought someone else would do it. Unfortunately, it still occurs in every-day situations.
“Maybe you’re aware of a friend who’s in a relationship that is physically, emotionally, and financially dangerous for them and you know that something’s happening, but you don’t know how to say something about it or to stop that interaction from happening or maybe it’s something where you have a friend who is a minority who is dealing with microaggressions and it’s awkward and you don’t know how to interject or say something,” Said Emily Gebhar, – counselor at FCC and coordinator of the wellness week – “Bystander training is really giving you tools to be able to step in, in a safe way to make sure that people are safe.”
On Tuesday, Oct. 18 students can visit the cafe from 10 a.m to noon to grab hygiene products while supplies last and at 1 p.m the Health Department will be presenting an hour-lonng Narcan Training.
“A lot of times substance use is used as a self-medication tool for people with mental illness so really just understanding and de-stigmatizing the use of it and understanding what your rights are and how you can help people in those situations. Being Narcan trained could save a life.” Genhar said.
On Wednesday, Oct. 19 students can visit the Wellness Fair at the Cafe where there will be around sixteen different resources including the Department of Social Services, Woman to Woman mentoring, free HIV testing, and many others. Participants in the wellness fair are given
the chance to get and use a stamp card, and if they collect five stamps from the various resources, they’ll be able to access a free lunch at the cafe that day.
On Thrusday, the Bike Smoothies allow students to ride bicycles as fast as they can to be rewarded with a smoothie, and from 2:00 p.m to 3:30 p.m Therapy Dogs are on rooms H202 aand H203!
Finally, on Friday Oct. 21 the Mental Health First Aid Training is taking place. Unfortunately registration for this session is already full, but students might keep an eye out for additional opportunities in the future as FCC might bring Mental Health First Aid Training classes to campus in a more regular basis. These courses which focus on teaching people how to spot signs of a mental health crisis and how to take action to deescalate it and take about a day to complete.
