Morris Let's Thrive
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Morris Let’s Thrive is a holistic campus initiative infusing evidence-based mental health and wellbeing practices, skill building, information and resources into UMN Morris students’ curricular and co-curricular life. Just as the seasons cycle on the prairie where forbs bloom at different times in spring, summer, and fall, grasses evolve and mature, and plants are sustained through winter and find new life in spring, so, too, does our path to wellbeing. The old settles into the earth and finds its way back to new growth.
What seeds of good health will you plant this week? Let’s create a community that sustains and supports our wellbeing together. Learn. Heal. Grow. Morris Let’s Thrive.
10 ways students can practice wellbeing
10 ways faculty and staff can facilitate student wellbeing
Academic Growth
When we engage in the learning process and find purpose in what we are doing, it can help us connect learning to a larger picture. Engagement, ideas, and investment start here. Learning that happens in college will help you imagine your future: your personal life, career, community and more.
Imagine good ways to advance your academic growth at UMN Morris:
- Can you meet regularly with your academic advisor?
- Can you work regularly with the Office of Academic Success and/or your first-year student success coach to identify strategies and resources to help you meet academic goals?
- If you have a psychological, learning, or physical health condition that impacts your life and academics, would a visit with the Disability Resource Center help? They can support accommodations and help develop plans to improve attendance and/or performance in your classes.
- Consider studying abroad and experiencing another part of the world.
- Explore the possibility of pursuing a research project with a faculty member.
- Consider internship opportunities and connections between college and careers?
Community
Connection, belonging, and community are all important parts of personal wellbeing and a whole and satisfying college experience. Community exists at the roots that support personal and interpersonal, collaborative and intellectual growth while in college.
Think about ways to foster your sense of community at UMN Morris:
- Find a student group or organization that would be a good fit for you.
- Build a connection with youth, elders, and community organizations in the city of Morris by working with the Office of Community Engagement.
- Check in regularly with your orientation group or residential life floor?
- Check out the on-campus jobs that would connect you with campus and maybe even a possible career.
- Make more time for family and friends.
- Cultivate relationships that make you feel good.
- Attend trainings like the Green Dot Bystander Prevention Program that grow your skills as a community member supporting others.
Cultural Connections
Learn more about your own and others’ history, cultures and lifeways through campus lectures and programs. Building relationships with and learning from people whose backgrounds are different from our own enriches our lives and supports better academic achievement as we encounter different ways of understanding the world and different ways of solving problems both large and small. Opportunities provided at UMN Morris to thrive in a diverse, close-knit community also lay the foundation for lifelong civic engagement and responsibility.
Are you ready to foster cultural connections?
- Connect with events and other people through the Multi-Ethnic Resource Center
- Get involved with a student organization with a cultural focus, such as the Circle of Nations Indigenous Association, Black Student Union, Jane Addams program, or Intervarsity Christian Fellowship (you do not need to be culturally affiliated with these groups to join and support them!)
- Attend an International Student Program Cultural Hour
- Take advantage of resources offered through the Multi-Ethnic Student Program, International Student Programs, LGBTQIA2S+ Programs
- Participate in, or serve as a peer mentor for, Gateway, STELLAR, and Native American Student Success.
Emotional Wellbeing
College can be an exciting time, and also a stressful one. New relationships, study habits, and “adulting” can bring up an array of new stressors . UMN Morris offers services and programs to help you manage stress, support your mental health, and foster emotional wellbeing as an integral part of college success.
To engage in positive emotional wellbeing at UMN Morris, you can:
- Attend new student orientation so you’ll be off to a great start.
- Prioritize good sleep.
- Arrange an appointment at student counseling or health service.
- Attend a Let’s Talk consultation
- Explore the Learn to Live on-line program
- Take a course that supports your wellbeing, such as Reclaiming Happiness
Financial Security
College finances and finding the resources to live independently can be stressful. . Learn to understand finances, budgeting, money management skills, and the benefits of earning a four-year degree (financially and in life) are important college priorities.
Here are some resources and programs to support your financial security:
- Adopt some financial principles. Check out these resources from UMD and “Live like a student now, so you don’t have to later.”
- Attend a Financial Wellness Appointment at One Stop.
- Attend a financial literacy workshop or take MGMT 1101: Fundamentals of Personal Finance.
- Join the Morris Healthy Eating initiative and learn to cook on a budget and participate in campus gardening. Consider the Food Assistance Programs or pick up a Food Resource bag on campus.
- Consider a quick-response a href="https://students.morris.umn.edu/%3Ca%20href%3D"https://onestop.morris.umn.edu/finances/grants-and-waivers">https://onestop.morris.umn.edu/finances/grants-and-waivers">emergency grant through the One Stop office for short-term financial emergencies.
Healthy Lifestyle
It can take time, effort, and motivation to give proper attention to a healthy lifestyle. UMN Morris makes healthy choices easy choices for students on campus.
Make space for health in your schedule:
- Take a walk outside or bike to the wind turbines and Pomme de Terre Park. Just 15 minutes being in nature can make a difference.
- Take a Sports Science and Athletics course – Fitness for Life, Taekwondo, or Strength Training.
- Develop an Regional Fitness Center routine, group fitness, swimming, walking, or lifting weights.
- Using personal training sessions to jump start any or all of the above
- Work with our dietitian to make a meal plan that fits for you
- Explore other community options for health and fitness
Living Sustainably
Living sustainably can mean different things to different people. By attending to your own needs and practicing regular self-care, you maintain reserves that enable you to support others; by reducing your use of earth’s natural resources, you support UMN Morris’s commitment to sustainability and contribute to sustainable futures.
You can live sustainably:
- Turn off lights and devices when you don’t need them.
- Reduce (what you buy), reuse, compost, recycle, and upcycle.
- Eat locally.
- Work with Morris Healthy Eating.
- Work in the Native Garden.
- Support the Morris Area Farmers Market.
- Support the work of the Office of Sustainability