A small group of students and staff gathered yesterday at noon around a coffee table, some sitting on mats on the floor, others on a couch or on padded chairs. Some ate their lunches and some picked Junior Mints and Dots from the candy jar in the middle of the table as they took an hour out of their day for discussion.
The group convened in the cozy office of Director of Drug and Alcohol Education Services Margot Abels, attracted there by its members' shared interest in community health issues at Tufts - and free candy, of course. The students, members of the Student Health Advisory Board (SHAB), are co-led by Abels and Michelle Bowdler, senior director of Tufts' Health and Wellness Service.
According to a mission statement provided by sophomore Morissa Sobelson, one of the group's two student presidents, the board's goal "is to serve as a student voice on policy pertaining to all forms of Tufts students' physical, mental and social health." The statement continues: "The end goal of SHAB is to help maintain as safe and healthy an environment for all Tufts students as is reasonably possible, and to make recommendations where improvements are possible to those capable of implementing change."
One of SHAB's recent projects is the condom dispensers located in dormitories and the campus center.
Abels said that the young condom dispenser initiative has enjoyed initial success. "Right now, it's considered a pilot project," she said. "The dispensers in the residence halls have had an increase in sales."
The group recognized the need to label the machines so that they are more visible to students. Members said that labels should appear soon.
SHAB is also pushing events today and Friday that recognize World AIDS Week. Tonight at 7:00 in Braker Hall 001, Abels and with other faculty and students interested in community health will meet with local researchers, professors and activists to reflect on the history of AIDS and to explore its future challenges in a program entitled "Looking Back, Moving Forward: 25 Years of HIV/AIDS."
Tomorrow, SHAB will co-host a lunch discussion at noon in East Hall 15 entitled "AIDS: The Unspoken and the Taboo."
Sobelson has a particularly strong interest in AIDS activism and research. "I am especially interested in the links between health and human rights," she said, "and AIDS is a subject which involves [both subjects]."
Sobelson, who joined the SHAB during the second semester of her freshman year, said that her passion for health and for providing a student voice on health issues spurred her interest in the group.
All but a few of the students of the group present at yesterday's meeting are community health majors, a common interest that naturally attracts them to different public health groups on campus. For example, Sobelson is also a co-leader of Tufts' HIV/AIDS Collaborative, and senior Talia Quandelacy, SHAB's other student president, is a leader of the group Public Health at Tufts (PHAT).
Sobelson said that membership in other groups naturally leads them to join SHAB. "There are small groups of people leading different groups," she said, "and logical linkages exist between [them]."
During the meeting, Sobelson and other students praised the collaboration that has occurred between other groups on campus, such as PHAT and Vitality, a Hillel initiative focused on wellness and nutrition.
The last part of SHAB's mission statement, which addresses policy recommendations, was the focus of yesterday's meeting. Elaine Theodore, the violence prevention coordinator at the Women's Center, focused specifically on how to prevent "self-injurious" behavior.
Theodore explained that such behavior includes eating disorders, over-exercising, binge drinking and self-cutting. She also said that whereas most men externalize their frustration, most women internalize it in the form of self-injurious violence.
Members of the group discussed their own experiences in dealing with friends who have exhibited self-destructive habits in order to motivate brainstorming discussion as to what can be done to prevent such practices.
Abels posed the question, "What would a wellness center look like?" She said that as far as she knows, Tufts is one of the few colleges without any suicide prevention centers.
Theodore said that self-injurious behavior is linked to other health factors, such as stress and depression. "There is a relationship between self-injurious behavior and [other factors]," she said.
In order to examine such linkages, Theodore proposed creation of a task force to examine the health trends among Tufts students, especially women.
The group also brainstormed possible policies geared towards first-year students. One student proposed forming mandatory sessions similar to "In the Sack" that first-years attend during orientation that would occur during midterms.
Another student said that policies should start addressing the question of what health issues occur before students arrive at college.
Abels also expressed excitement about a new stress relief and sleep campaign next semester.
Though no policy decisions were made at the meeting, the groups generated plenty of ideas. "This is the perfect group to start brainstorming," Sobelson said.
Abels said that SHAB has a "lengthy history" at Tufts. She praised this semester's group: "They're the most organized that I've seen."
