Today@Sam Article
4 Health Events 4 Kats
March 25, 2019
SHSU Media Contact: Jamol Simon
The Office of Health Promotion at Sam Houston State University is hosting a collection of events to start off the spring season. Throughout April there will be a host of events intended to bring awareness to various issues happening on campus and resources available to students and employees.
Springing off the month’s events is the Life in Recovery panel discussion on March 27. The panel intends to fight the stigma that people struggling with addiction may face. Assistant Director for the Office of Health Promotion Megan Richardson details why the event was created.
“The Life in Recovery panel discussion will be sponsored by our Kats 4 Recovery collegiate recovery program which helps students who are in recovery from alcohol or substance abuse and supplies a peer support network for them,” Richardson said. “We know that the media portrays college as all about partying and drinking and all the fun stuff, but when you’re in recovery it can be really hard if you think you’re going through this alone.”
The panel will consist of multiple speakers who are in various stages of their recovery process. The discussion will take place in the Lowman Student Center Theater at 4 p.m. and is open to the general public.
Second on the agenda is Spring into Health Fair on April 11. This biannual event was first hosted in Fall 2018 and is returning to continue familiarizing students with the different health services that the campus has to offer.
“The Health Center is really there to promote the resources we have on campus and the initiative that we have going on,” Richardson said. “There will be giveaways and food as well.”
The fair will also tie in “Get Yourself Tested” (GYT) which is one of their bigger health initiatives and the format will be a bit different than semesters prior.
“Students will have to pick up a voucher in order to get free STD testing and that will be available at the Health Fair or stop by our offices,” Richardson said.
To learn more about the health resources available on campus or to pick up a GYT voucher, the fair will be in the Orange Ballroom of the LSC from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.
On April 15, the month continues with a United Against Human Trafficking event discussing what trafficking is and how it affects the campus community. Richardson believes this event can create a dialogue which will hopefully lead to a better understanding of the issue.
“Human trafficking is a problem that we don’t really talk about that much, but we’re starting to hear about it more and more,” Richardson said. “It’s something that we need to learn the warning signs of and whether you know it or not it’s very likely that someone on campus has been affected by it.”
The event will be open to the general public and can be found in the LSC Theater at 3 p.m.
Closing out the month is the National Faculty and Staff Health Assessment. On April 15, the Office of Health Promotion is giving faculty and staff the opportunity to complete a survey in efforts to improve the overall health of the campus.
“With this survey we are trying to get a baseline of what employee health is here at Sam. We realize that student health has an influence on employee health and employee health also has an influence on student health,” Richardson said. “If you have a professor that comes in having a super bad day, they probably aren’t going to be great in the classroom that day. So based off the feedback from this we can determine health priorities for our employees.”
The survey will be open from April 15 to May 3, giving faculty and staff three academic weeks to complete it.
Taking your health into your own hands can be a scary thing, especially for most students on campus who have never experienced that avenue of independence. Richardson expresses how attending these events could benefit those students.
“I think it’s just fear of the unknown. For a lot of students this is their first time making health decisions on their own,” Richardson said. “That can be a bit scary if you don’t know what you’re getting yourself into. So events like the health fair are there to discuss the process and answer any questions that students might have.”
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