Don Graham, Kimberly Scott, and
Pedro Douglas
|
Body, Mind, and Spirit
CSU, Chico provides ample resources to help students establish
healthy habits
By mary abowd
When Heather Webb arrived at CSU, Chico four years ago, she wasn’t
using her free time wisely. “As a freshman, I was making bad
decisions,” she says. “Staying up late, eating unhealthy
foods, going to a bunch of stupid parties—the stuff that everybody
else is doing, so you just join in.”
An A student in high school, Webb saw her grades sink. “I
was getting all B’s, which for me isn’t that good,”
she says.
That changed when she saw a flyer posted in her residence hall advertising
women’s rugby, a sport club sponsored by the recreational
sports department. She’d never played before but, craving
the exercise—and the competition—decided to go for it.
During rugby season, which runs from January to May, Webb engaged
in a schedule of daily practice and conditioning with games, often
at other universities, on Saturdays.
She quickly saw results. “My first semester playing rugby,
my grades improved,” she says. “You know you have to
go to practice, so instead of sitting around, you do your homework.”
The regimen also kept her fit. “It helped prevent the freshman
15,” she says, referring to the common condition of gaining
weight when living in campus housing.
Webb’s rugby experience had an additional benefit as well.
Her coaches, Mary and Alex Triantfyllou, both CSU, Chico alums and
former rugby players, created a little piece of home for students
living on their own for the first time.
“They would invite us over to their house for barbecues,”
she recalls. “They created a feeling of being part of a family
and that kept me wanting to go back.”
Healthy activities
Each year the Department of Recreational Sports offers 15 sport
clubs for students, such as field hockey, cycling, ultimate Frisbee,
volleyball, and water polo. Sport clubs are made up of CSU, Chico
students who form teams and compete against their peers at other
universities in California and the western United States. It means
a serious practice schedule and accommodates those who may not make
varsity but still want to play a competitive sport. “I played
soccer all throughout high school and kind of knew I wasn’t
good enough try out for the college team,” says Webb, who
served two years as co-president of women’s rugby before graduating
last spring with a degree in recreation administration.
The offerings are part of the recreational sports program’s
commitment to providing healthy alternatives for students during
their years at CSU, Chico and helping them realize their potential,
as Webb did.
“Any time we can have students make quality choices, we want
to be able to provide that opportunity,” says Curtis Sicheneder,
the department’s associate director.
Students who don’t want the commitment of a sport club can
participate in the department’s intramural programs. Recreational
Sports offers a minimum of five intramural sports each semester—such
as five-on-five basketball, softball, and indoor soccer—with
different divisions based on skill level. Students form their own
teams and compete against each other.
During the academic year, sport clubs, intramurals, and “open
rec” opportunities, such as weight lifting, serve at least
half the student body, nearly 7,500 students. The recreational sports
program attempts to reach out to students as soon as they hit the
campus. Incoming freshmen applying for housing can choose to live
on a recreational sports “theme floor” in the residence
halls, where they can reside among others interested in fitness.
Sicheneder says it’s a way for students to “connect
as early as possible” to recreational sports’ offerings
by living with peers who are committed to exercise and are likely
to head to the gym for fun. “The goal is to get them over
here using our facilities and programs early on,” he adds.
To provide state-of-the-art facilities, construction of an 11,000-square-foot
recreation center is slated for completion fall 2008 at the corner
of 2nd and Cherry Streets. Sponsored by Associated Students, the
$55-million center promises to house a large lap pool, an indoor
track, several gymnasium courts, and three multi-purpose dance and
aerobics studios.
“One of the great things about a rec center is being able
to offer students alternatives right from the start,” says
Recreational Sports Director Kimberly Scott, an alternative to what
she calls “the inertia of going downtown to clubs and bars.”
The complex will also provide needed social space. “Rec centers
have become the student unions of the past,” says David Buckley,
executive director of Associated Students. “Students will
find e-mail stations, lounge space, a juice bar where they can get
healthy drinks—designated spaces for students to congregate,
meet, and relax.”
Participation in a recreational activity boosts academic performance
and aids in student retention. As Buckley puts it, “Those
who take care of their body do better in the classroom.” Recreation
centers are also a powerful way to attract potential students, according
to a 2004 article by the National Association of Student Personnel
Administrators.
Recreational Sports is joined by other campus facilities—the
Student Health Center, the Psychological Counseling Center, and
the Campus Wellness Center—dedicated to fostering mind and
body wellness.
Healthy bodies
Exercise is crucial to overall health, says Barry Furst, a staff
physician at the Student Health Center. When students come in complaining
of exhaustion, he often points them in the direction of the gym.
“Not infrequently someone who was a multisport athlete in
high school comes in saying, ‘Why am I so fatigued?’
” says Furst. “We get them exercising again and they
say, ‘Wow, I feel so much better. I thought I had cancer.’
”
During the school year, Furst and his colleagues—four full-time
physicians, six nurse practitioners, and a physician’s assistant—treat
between 200 and 300 students a day, a steady stream of colds, rashes,
allergies, and sprained ankles. “We’re busy all the
time,” says Furst.
CSU, Chico students can access a range of health services from malaria
and typhoid shots for travel abroad, to gynecological exams, to
help in conquering addiction, whether it be to cigarettes, alcohol,
or food. Each day, mental health problems comprise roughly one-third
of cases.
In the center’s pharmacy, prescription drugs are available
at a discount. Furst points to the pharmacy’s patient assistance
program, where those “without insurance or a big bank account”
can receive drugs for free or at a deep discount.
Since assuming his post in 2001, Student Health Service Director
Pedro Douglas has attempted to educate students with the help of
student peer educators who each year fan out over the campus to
give health talks in residence halls and classrooms, and to campus
organizations on issues like safer sex, stress management, and good
hygiene. “The best thing you can do is educate,” says
Douglas. “If it’s flu season, make sure you get your
flu vaccine. To stop the spread of germs, wash your hands.”
Peer educators also know what matters most to other students. “They
really relate to the students and they know what the scene is,”
says Michelle McGivern, an older student who worked closely with
peer educators last spring while fulfilling an internship in health
administration at the health center.
The students’ love of river rafting led to sessions on skin
cancer and dehydration. With West Nile virus now in Northern California,
educators talked about taking precautions against mosquito exposure
in places like Bidwell Park. “It’s great information
coming from someone who looks like them,” McGivern says, “not
from a white coat.”
Healthy minds
While physical health is essential, it is only part of a person’s
overall health, says Don Graham, director of the Psychological Counseling
Center and the Wellness Center. At college, many young people face
new stresses as they live independently for the first time, adjust
to the rigors of academic course work, and try to find a place among
their peers.
The Psychological Counseling Center offers free counseling to those
who are in crisis or simply need help to resolve personal problems
or make life decisions. “The major issues we’re dealing
with are depression, anxiety, and relationship issues,” says
Graham. “But we cover all kinds of problems people have.”
Those problems include loss of a loved one, a struggle with an eating
disorder, and questions about sexual identity.
Last year the center provided more than 2,100 individual counseling
sessions with a typical client receiving between three and four
meetings with a counselor. “An awful lot of students really
need one or two sessions to get them back on track,” he adds.
The center cannot do long-term counseling, however, so if additional
help is needed, referrals are made to therapists in the community.
Although the stigma once associated with therapy has diminished
over the past 20 years, Graham says outreach to the student population
remains an “ongoing battle,” with thousands of new students
arriving each year who need to be informed about the center’s
offerings. And as the campus diversifies racially and ethnically,
special attention must go to reaching members of communities who
may find it taboo to seek help in solving problems from someone
outside their family.
Healthy habits
Much of that outreach is generated from the campus Psychological
Counseling and Wellness Center, which sponsors student interns who,
as in the Student Health Center, act as peer educators, giving presentations
to classes, fraternities and sororities, and residence hall students
on a variety of topics.
Last year, Uraci Mathews, a graduate student in psychology, coordinated
a team of peer educators from various majors—psychology, nutrition,
physical education, and business and marketing—who conducted
educational efforts such as Eating Disorders Week, a Fun Without
Alcohol Fair, and a forum on healthy relationships called Love Doesn’t
Hurt.
“The importance of the peer education is to let people know
there are options and resources for them,” says Mathews. “They’re
not out there alone to suffer by themselves.”
The week before finals, Mathews and her interns organized a “De-stress
Fest” where students could drop by the BMU lobby to receive
a free massage, squeeze a stress ball, munch on granola, and partake
in some dance and yoga. “People were lined up waiting for
their massages,” she recalls. “It really seemed to be
something they appreciated.”
The college years are full of challenges for students but also
an opportunity to begin creating healthy patterns. “They’re
young,” says Pedro Douglas of the health center. “You
set habits now that you maintain for the rest of your life. If you
start now, it will have a lasting effect.” |
