Campus Highlight: The Happiness & Wellness Initiative

This Fall, we’re so happy to introduce Bonnie Miranda, Project Manager for the School of Public Health’s Happiness & Wellness Initiative. Bonnie shares information about H&W Initiative’s awesome events, connections to the campus comfort dog, tips for wellness – and how to become an intern!

TTC: Welcome to the Terps Take Care newsletter, Bonnie! I’m so excited to get to chat with you and learn some more about the Happiness & Wellness Initiative and how it can help support Terps. My understanding is that the Initiative runs out of the School of Public Health, and that it’s more than just a loose coalition  of ideas – that you all actually offer opportunities for students to interact and get involved as well. Can you start by telling us a little more about that? 

  • BM: Our initiative supports the wellness of students by creating access to information (facts, tips, and anecdotes) and events related to the 8 dimensions of wellness. We host different events and activities for students in our Wellness Room (SPH 0113), particularly during stressful times such as finals week. Some of these events include making crafts for Pride, yoga sessions, meditation practice, gratitude journaling, a really cool Wikipedia Edit-a-Thon for Women’s History Month, and even guest appearances by University of Maryland’s official comfort dog, Teddy the Terp! We also make sure to offer coffee, tea, and snacks during finals week.

Meet Teddy the Terp through
SPH’s Happiness & Wellness Initiative!

TTC: That’s a lot of opportunities to engage around wellness and health improvement. I know a lot of our students really love the opportunity to connect with Wags for Wellness, too, so I’m sure having additional access to Teddy the Terp will be extremely exciting for some of them! Now for some background info. Can you tell us a little bit more about how the H&W Initiative go started?

  • BM: The H & W Initiative was created out of a desire to better support the health and wellness of our students, faculty, staff, and community partners in SPH, at UMD, and beyond. More specifically, a retiring faculty member shared their experience around stress at work and the value of a proposed happiness initiative. The idea was then expanded upon and the H & W Initiative was born. Its debut was escalated at the onset of Covid 19 when we recognized an extreme need to support the physical, mental, and social wellbeing of our community.

TTC: What kind of message are you hoping Terps take from the H&W Initiative? And how do those ideals get implemented within your own teams?

  • BM: Dedicating even just a small amount of time daily and weekly to easily-understood and easily-implemented wellness tips can have a significant impact on personal and community health and wellbeing. We attend and participate in our own events and practice the wellness tips. We experience the benefits of the community across UMD that is part of this practice.

TTC: I love that you are participants as well as coordinators and facilitators. You clearly believe in the value of these events and activities, and I love that you’re incorporating them into your own lives. So if a student is interested in learning more or attending events, how can they find you?

TTC: Bonnie, thanks so much for your time today. This is truly a wonderful effort and resource for our students and all community members. Before we say goodbye, is there anything else at all that you’d like to make sure our Terps know?

  • BM:Yes! There are a lot of resources to connect and participate with and the variety can seem overwhelming, so picking and choosing just a few to participate in or incorporate is ok and can still have a great impact. They can make recommendations for tips, articles, and events by emailing happyandwell@umd.edu. They can partner with us to host a wellness event individually or as part of a student organization. And finally, they can be interns with our H & W Initiative by emailing happyandwell@umd.edu!