To deal with the stresses of higher education and everyday life, struggles all too familiar to many students, Minh Pho took up a creative outlet and a challenge.
He started his own photo project, taking new photos daily to keep his mind off the anxieties of his classes and schoolwork. Wellness @ Maryland, the university’s wellness center, had a similar idea when it launched its campuswide Stress Less Photo Challenge, asking students and staff to submit photos through April 14 that reflect how students keep their worries in perspective.
“It gives me a sense that I can stay on top of things, and is really helpful in reminding me to take it easy once in a while,” Pho said.
The challenge, which began April 1, is part of the center’s yearlong Stress Less initiative, which aims to educate students on symptoms and effects of stress and healthy ways to manage them. Because stress is the No. 1 health problem on college campuses, according to national data, the university wanted to make a priority of helping students keep calm, said Kate Maloney, Wellness communications coordinator.
“Sometimes stress seems like a badge of honor on campus, and if you’re not stressed, you’re not doing something right,” Maloney said. “But you don’t have to stress for success. We wanted to rewrite the story of stress at UMD and teach Terps to take charge of managing their own stress.”
Students can enter the photo challenge at any time during its duration, and can submit one photo for each day’s theme through the group’s Facebook app, “Stress Less Photo Challenge.” When the challenge is over, a randomly selected participant will win an iPad mini, and the two photos voted as favorites for each theme will win a free T-shirt. The app received almost 400 submissions during the challenge’s first four days, Maloney said.
Wellness staff conceived the photo challenge after seeing the 7 Day Stress Less Challenge succeed in October. That event invited students to spend 10 minutes each day for a week engaging in a stress-relieving activity. The last day of the program requested that students send in a picture, and many students participated, inspiring staff to come up with an even bigger event.
“We decided to play off the photo challenge idea, but we always wanted to incorporate a social media aspect of it,” she said. “So we built a Facebook app that was a combination of those things, and let students interact through stress-relieving activities.”
Now in its eighth day, the photo challenge has garnered submissions that range from a dog relaxing on the Fourth of July to a couple parasailing in Aruba. Using the app not only teaches students how to handle their stress, but is also a stress reliever in itself, said senior community health major Chardon Hunt.
“It really brings the eye to things that we do every day to manage stress, but may not really realize it,” Hunt said. “A lot of the themes really focus on spiritual wellness, eating well and being active, which are all things that can decrease stress.”
Many students are unaware of useful ways to de-stress because of a lack of formal education on this topic and the busy nature of college students’ lifestyles, said Meghan Cohen, Center for Health and Wellbeing coordinator. Negatively managing stress can cause short-term effects such as headaches, difficulty making decisions and irritability, and can cause even more problems in the long term, Cohen said.
“The most severe way that stress can negatively impact students is through mental health issues that can arise,” she said. “But the challenge is a good example that solving these problems is not as hard as people think. It can be as simple as sitting outside and enjoying nature, which Day 3 of the challenge encouraged students to do.”
Cohen also encouraged students to use other resources on the campus aimed at managing stress. These include individual stress management training programs in the Center for Health and Wellbeing, meditation sessions and the University Counseling Center. However, there are also other ways students can cope with their stress, she said.
“Students should try and improve their time management skills so that they lead a more balanced lifestyle,” Cohen said. “Also, sleeping, eating well and exercise are all very important.”
