This article is part of a running series with Rowan University’s Wellness Center. This collaboration aims to educate students about personal well-being options. For further updates, follow @RowanUWellness on Twitter, Instagram or Facebook.
Meet Roxy Urso, senior Biology major, who wrote this article with the inspiration of the Rowan Thrive campaign that has been around campus this semester. Roxy shares: “Oftentimes, people get caught up in the idea of mental health and the awareness of it, and while it is extremely important, mental health has many other factors that play into it to make a total person. As college students, our lives are always crazy, so by taking a step back and working on different aspects of wellness on a small scale, we will have a greater impact on our mental health and ourselves overall.”
Over and over again it has been stressed to college students to practice good mental health, to have a strong mindset in the chaos that is the world of academia. Topics of a person’s wellness and well-being are constantly thrown in with these ideas to make it sound like these topics are no more than mental health. However, people often forget that a strong mental well-being is hard to achieve without all elements of well-being having their own presence.
Well-being is an encapsulation of a person through all aspects of their life, as they work together to create an individual, no matter the mindset. However, the more positive each area is on their own, the more likely the individual will have an overall positive well-being. These eight areas of well-being include: emotional, financial, social, spiritual/purpose, occupational, physical, intellectual and environmental. Understanding that well-being is not just a mental state, but the state of a person that is developed by each of these eight areas, can allow a person to work on each one, ultimately working on all, to better themselves as a whole.
For example, by setting a goal to study everyday for a class, a person would be working not only on their intellectual well-being, but their sense of purpose by preparing more for school to be able to graduate, and their occupational because they are most likely trying to graduate to find a job.
Although the idea of working on eight areas of a person’s life may seem overwhelming, it only takes small steps towards each to reach a state that not only betters their mental state, but their person as a whole.
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Story by:
Roxy Urso, senior biology major, Wellness Center intern
Photography by:
Alyssa Bauer, senior public relations major
References
Boston University Center for Psychiatric Rehabilitation. (n.d.). Eight Dimensions of Wellness. Retrieved from https://cpr.bu.edu/living-well/eight-dimensions-of-wellness/
function, grow and recharge within just hours. When students decide to go into the next step in their lives and go to college, one of the things students lose is sleep. Most college students get an average of six hours of sleep each night, while the recommended amount of sleep for young adults is 7-9 hours a night (MayoClinic). When a person doesn’t get enough sleep each night, it can come with consequences.
of classes, and a complaint from your stomach reminds you that you haven’t eaten a meal since last night. Sometimes class schedules cut straight through normal meal times. Sometimes homework that’s due in a few hours takes priority over finding time to eat. Sometimes the 10-a-week meal plan just doesn’t cut it. But one way or another, sometimes we fill up on our morning coffee and don’t eat a meal for 18 hours or more. Perhaps the meals were replaced with snacks: a granola bar, goldfish, maybe a banana. Oh, well. It can’t be 
The advisors and faculty within the department were eager to help an interested — and experienced, as a bonus — student transition into this exciting new major. 
themselves displaying patterns of behaviors that may or may not reflect their values. 
Often, it is easier for young people to recognize abuse in intimate partnerships than in their immediate social circles. Commonly referenced in literature surrounding domestic abuse is the power and control wheel developed by the Domestic Abuse and Intervention Project in Duluth Minnesota (“Power and Control Wheels,” 2017). It details eight methods of power and control: coercion/threats, intimidation, emotional abuse, isolation, obfuscation, economic abuse, using children and using male privilege. While some elements of the Power and Control wheel may only apply to heteronormative intimate partnerships, others can be applied to all relationships. 
gmatization of eating disorders, but still little discussion about disordered eating behaviors that may not seem so obvious or extreme.” 
Coming into Rowan University, her intro business courses were super general and informative, which allowed her to explore marketing and supply chain logistics in a more in-depth manner. This helped her decide where she wanted to be within those fields. Currently, she works at Rowan University’s Business Hall. This past summer, she worked in a recruiting agency in Parsippany, NJ, which she found through 
Erin is a part of University Innovation Fellows, a Stanford University run program where students are recommended by their university business or engineering professors to get involved in. She was one of the four students chosen from Rowan to join the program. The four students are tasked to find a problem with the university and attempt to fix it by getting funding. Erin chose to focus on solving the hunger problem at Rowan. She devised a plan in which students can donate their meal swipes to other students in need. This is in its beginning stages, and if it passes, the group will be sent out to Stanford in the spring and go to Google’s Headquarters to present.
Marko decided to look into the 
The “everything else in life” just happens to consist of more great opportunities for Marko, such as an internship this semester with the 
(Mercer County), is charging through college in the 
Last semester, Shreya visited the 
Gaspare is a transfer student from 
Gaspare is doing his work under a hood at regular temperature and regular pressure, because it’s much safer and financially achievable for most labs.
What did you like the most about Rowan?
Alyssa will become the first doctor in her family; both her parents chose different careers outside of the medical field. “I really want to become a doctor, so I liked how it [the TBS major] kind of had a built-in premed track. I want to be a pediatrician,” she said.
Kasey took classes in children’s and adolescent literature that helped her to prepare for her summer role. “I reached out to my professors and told them, ‘The books I read in your classes are in my curriculum — thank you! Your choices applied to my life in a way I was not expecting.’”
From Hackettstown, NJ (Warren County), Kasey stayed in South Jersey this summer solely to complete this internship. With she and her parents’ lacking familiarity with Camden — only knowing what they’ve seen on the news — at first Kasey’s parents had some trepidation about their daughter teaching in the city. “My dad is nervous about everything,” Kasey says. “But, the school was nice. The location was fine. I wasn’t nervous and the drive wasn’t bad at all.
Another wonderful experience provided by the Rowan Journalism department was the opportunity to take a class and cover the Democratic National Convention in 2016. This experience made him feel like a true reporter. He even referred to this as “the Super Bowl for journalists.” He covered protests, made livestreams and networked all from a South Jersey perspective. He said this experience helped in the transition from college journalist to professional.
After his internship at the Ellen Show, Purvis moved onto another big-name internship, “Good Morning America,” where he learned how to create a morning TV show at the network level. Along with getting the network TV experience under his belt, he also made some recognizable friends along the way! Once again Purvis followed one amazing internship with another. In fall 2017, he began his work for “The Today Show.”
Through RIPPAC, Jason applied for the Rick Rosenberg Junior Memorial Scholarship, which allows students to take unpaid political internships. Most political internships are unpaid, meaning that most students can’t afford to take these important experiences. Through the generosity of the Rosenberg family, students who are awarded the scholarship are provided with the financial cushion that will allow them to further their careers.
time to transfer to a four-year institution was approaching. I needed to decide quickly and be absolutely certain I made the right choice. Eventually I came to the aviation industry – settling on the idea that I wanted to become a pilot. This decision lead me to a university out in northern Arizona. 
I just didn’t know of any other options that would fit me.
Rowan I received a student worker position as a digital content contributor for Rowan’s Division of Student Affairs. A position I received from interacting with one of my professors (who I now work with). She inspired me to pursue various aspects of public relations – eventually leading me to my passions in 
programs, courtesy of the Exploratory Studies program, I decided to pursue a 
During her first computer science course on campus, Monica learned the ins and outs of the industry, as well as coding and communication skills that she would use later on. Her first professor in the field, Professor Chia Chien, “has been a huge help throughout my college experience. She really encouraged me and opened my eyes to great opportunities.” Professor Chien even introduced her to her current resume-builder, as a co-op worker for the Arctic Slope Regional Corporation (ASRC). Through the AFMS (ASRC Federal Mission Solutions) program with the Rowan computer science department, students can partake in a real-life work environment and contribute to meaningful projects that improve their skills. “The program allows students to immerse themselves in a real job, full time, with the option to take classes part time, at night or online,” Monica explains. “You partner with industry companies and really learn how they function and how your knowledge can contribute.” 
