As the new semester gears up into full swing, and we trudge through the cold, dark days of February, I have been feeling incredibly prone to burnout and procrastination, and I bet I’m not alone. Rather than doing homework, I’ve been spending hours scrolling through Pinterest and Instagram, lacking the motivation to get any work done, and in my classes during the school day, I’m not much better.
Thankfully, this school year, there is a new resource available that can help students effectively deal with mental health issues and get back into a focused mental state during the school day. Students of BHS, meet: The Wellness Center.
I got the chance to sit down with Staci Kianpour, a nationally certified counselor and the Mental Health Advocate in charge of coordinating the Wellness Center, to understand the purpose of the center and what benefits it can provide to students.
According to Kianpour, “This is a space and a place where students can do a number of different things, but if the student is experiencing high stress, intense emotions, fear, anxiety, anything unpleasant that can interfere with learning, this is a place where they can come…The idea is to immerse students in a calming, peaceful, safe, tranquil, serene, picturesque environment and then supply ideas for how to calm down.”
Upon visiting the Wellness Center, I found it filled with fidget toys, kinetic sand, art supplies, and comfy seating. The walls are painted a deep teal and fairy lights provide subtle lighting. Kianpour explains that this is meant to be a calming place, centered on mental health and restoring students’ wellness throughout the course of the day.
“The idea is that the student comes in, feels better, goes back to class, and is able to reengage with learning after becoming balanced.”
Why is it so important that students have the Wellness Center as a resource? Kianpour says it goes beyond the routine stress of an academic day. Another part of her goal in operating the Wellness Center is to help students find ways to maintain their wellness in an age of technology onslaught.
“I just feel like [this generation] is up against more in terms of all the input that’s coming in through technology that, to me, has gone beyond our capabilities to handle in terms of our nervous systems and minds… Your nervous systems, your physical bodies, your brains are all evolving and developing at the same time that [technology] is hitting you, and I don’t think we really know the long-term effects,” says Kianpour.
Kianpour also hopes to help students define what “wellness” means to them and find ways to stay mentally healthy inside and outside of school. She hopes to use the Wellness Center to provide “education and management tools around a lot of technology use, and then wellness itself.”
As she helps students to discover what wellness looks like for them, Kianpour is also working to redefine what wellness looks like within the Wellness Center! “I would love to have students involved with projects that can develop aspects of the wellness center. I’d love to display student art and photography in here, develop an online wellness center with resources to use… The biggest thing is, this is a place and a service for students. I hope and want to actually learn from students what they would like to see, what would help everyone feel better, as individuals and as a community.”
She also hopes that the Wellness Center provides a chance to find community and connection within the school. “Ultimately,” says Kianpour, “it’s a place where I hope students get a sense of awe and wonder and feel empowered. It’s beyond just ‘I gotta calm down.’ It’s the whole thing.”
If you’re interested, fill out this survey to provide input about what you would like to see in Boulder High’s Wellness Center. And if you haven’t already, go visit the Wellness Center, located just off the side of the cafeteria and open eight periods a day. With your collaboration, the Wellness Center can become a space and a community for the whole of Boulder High.
