Aloha Yellow Jackets,
 
Welcome to week six of your Fall semester! For many students, we are going into our first round of exams. Can you believe it? Now is the time to take a few extra moments to practice mindfulness and self-care to help you be at optimal capacity to achieve your academic performance goals.  A few suggestions that students have found helpful include: 

• Set clearly defined, specific, and realistic goals for each day and don’t overwhelm yourself. For example, instead of setting a goal like “Get all my reading done,” set a goal to “Finish Chapters 3 and 4 for my science course.”
• Take a digital detox: unplug and log off of social media (this includes TikTok, Reddit, Instagram, Facebook and Twitter).  These distractions are invisible time suckers and can hurt your academic goals more than they provide social support. Research also shows that excessive time spent on social media can lead to increased anxiety, depression, and loneliness, as well as sleep disruptions and decreased attention span. 
• Find a comfortable study space where you can easily focus – have you checked out the multitude of new spaces in the John Lewis Student Center?!  Even as construction continues around the campanile, it offers beautiful views of our campus. Oldies but goodies like the Clough Undergraduate Learning Commons and the Library also offer great spaces.  Or find a secluded outdoor space and enjoy nature while working on homework.
• Set aside at least 30 minutes to get moving around each day – I use a Fitbit to track my steps daily; I particularly like walking on campus, especially now that the weather is starting to turn cooler. Or head over to the Campus Recreation Center and sprint around the track, swim some laps in the pool, or take a Zumba class!
• Being mindful about hydration and nutrition to fuel brain and body – Tech Dining has a lot of options all around campus, open and available to meet your nutritional needs. You should aim to consume at least eight glasses (or 64 ounces in total) of water or other fluids each day; if it is hot or you are exercising heavily, you will need more. And not all foods are equal: aim to eat as many fresh fruits and vegetables as you can each day. 
• And it isn’t too late to ask for help!  The Office of the Dean of Students or the CARE staff within the Center for Mental Health Care & Resources can assist you with anxiety, depression, stress management and other similar concerns. Lastly, don’t forget about the many academic support services that are offered at Georgia Tech: academic tutoring, writing center, or peer coaching can help you through this more stressful time of the semester and build confidence in your academic skills.
• This is also a good time to conduct an inventory of yourself and your social wellness.  Have you developed and utilized a network of friends, family, fur babies and others who can offer emotional support or a psychological sounding board? In what ways have you found community on campus, doing the things that make you smile or happy? Building and sustaining these authentic connections are an important part of the collegiate experience and a key aspect of your overall wellness. 
  
  If you are still wondering how to get your “circle of trust” established, start by getting connected in spaces where you can explore your interests or hobbies and that will open doors to new friends.  The Center for Student Engagement or one of our resource centers can help you learn where to build these connections!

Last month in my monthly newsletter, I introduced to you the Cultivate Well-Being Action & Transformation Roadmap (for students).  Although this Roadmap will take time to fully implement (as it should be done in-order to truly make an impact), the dimensions of wellness are areas in which you can do a little self-reflection and find small ways to adjust your self-care or behavior to make big impacts in your life.
 
Two of the action strategies outlined in this Roadmap moved forward this month with the launch of the Wellness Empowerment Center (WE Center) and the Center for Mental Health Care & Resources. The creation of these two new centers complements the dedication to campus culture change and improved well-being for our entire campus community that will be the new focus of the Division of Student Engagement and Well-Being and the Cultivate Well-Being Action and Transformation Roadmap.

Introducing the Wellness Empowerment Center 
Formerly known as Health Initiatives, the Wellness Empowerment Center (WE Center) aims to educate, encourage, and equip students to prioritize their own health and wellness, as well as become active participants in healthy lifestyle choices. It will provide research-based programs and services that advocate for holistic wellness, with a special emphasis on addressing the unique needs of students with marginalized identities.
 
Using a comprehensive approach, the WE Center will focus its efforts on the eight dimensions of wellness: environmental, emotional, financial, intellectual, occupational, physical, social, and spiritual.
 
Getting to Know Emotional Wellness
In alignment with the launch of the Cultivate Well-Being Action and Transformation Roadmap, I want to start describing each of the eight dimensions and offer ways to make small changes that may make a big impact. By finding practical, relatively easy, and realistic ways to administer a little extra self-care on a regular basis, you can begin to transform your own life.  We’ll discuss one dimension per month for the rest of the academic year.  I encourage you to find ways to apply these tips in your own life.
 
First, let’s learn about emotional wellness.

Introducing the Center for Mental Health Care & Resources
The second center to launch this month, the Center for Mental Health Care and Resources, reorganizes the Center for Assessment, Referral, and Education (CARE) and the Counseling Center into one cohesive unit for mental health care delivery. And it will include a dotted reporting line from Stamps Psychiatry to ensure that student mental health care is purposefully coordinated and integrated. The Center will also proactively promote mental health and advance a culture of self-care and of shared community responsibility around crisis response and case management. 
 
Individual counseling will remain an important part of our mental health campus services and we want to pivot to also focus more heavily on prevention, proactive efforts, and self-care as important tools in a person’s wellness.
 
Listening Sessions for Our Global Community
And finally, I want to take a moment to acknowledge the turmoil that his happening around the world that may be impacting your emotional wellness, making it difficult to concentrate or focus on your studies.  Many nations are confronted with significant challenges, conflicts, natural disasters, and/or outright war.  As a global community, many of us feel the impacts, in some cases deeply.  I want to reiterate that Georgia Tech is here to support you, no matter the reason or circumstances that may be pulling you down.
 
In particular, I want to reach out to our Yellow Jackets from Iran or who identify as Iranian. The escalating violence and unrest have resulted in anxiety and distress as students and scholars here watch their family and friends endure the strife within their home country.  The Center for Mental Health Care & Resources has planned listening sessions to support students who may be struggling with what they are feeling; visit their webpage to learn when and where these are taking place.  If you are feeling negatively impacted by what is happening, please consider participating in one of these events.
 
Go Jackets!