Students were able to get information about health- and wellness-related internships and speak with committee leaders at an event Monday.
The undergraduate student government Student Wellness Commission held a resource fair called the Well-Fair in Bruin Plaza to encourage students to learn more about wellness-related issues and become involved in SWC, said Christina Lee, the undergraduate student government Student Wellness commissioner.
Students could also share their definition of love on a blackboard and take free menstrual products, condoms and snacks.
SWC consists of 12 committees that advocate for student health. A few of the committees had booths at the event, including Active Minds, CPR & First Aid, Body Image Task Force, AIDS Awareness committee and Bruin Consent Coalition.
“Since October is Domestic Violence Awareness Month, we wanted to kick off the month on a really positive note,” said Chloe Pan, co-director of Bruin Consent Coalition. “We got a couple dozen individual messages written on the blackboard.”
Last year, the commission held a similar event called Healthcoming, which placed committee booths throughout campus. This year, SWC changed the name to Well-Fair as a homage to the commission’s previous name, the Student Welfare Commission, Lee said. She added the event was more centralized this year because the committees’ tables were all located in Bruin Plaza.
“This brings more of a sense of unity because last year the booths were separated,” Lee said. “It was not as evident that we were all part of one organization.”
Pan said she thinks the event was useful because it was held at the beginning of the school year and focused on student health.
“It’s really emphasizing the importance of self-care because it’s not something that you should only be thinking about when midterms and finals come around,” Pan said.
[Read more: Bruin Consent Coalition aims to empower through self-care art]
Some students said the event helped them learn more about the different opportunities available to them through the committees.
Sam Lee, a second-year psychobiology student, said she is now considering applying for a committee position, which she would not have known about without the event.
Sarah Kang, a second-year psychology student, said she thinks the event was informative and piqued her interest about the committees but could have been more cohesive.
Lee said SWC is planning for other committee-specific events this quarter, such as the AIDS Awareness committee’s free HIV testing for World AIDS Day and Active Minds’ Mental Health Fair. Monday’s Well-Fair served as the one quarterly commission-wide event for fall.