Annual Health & Wellness Summit brings together colleagues from across the system
CU ǸԹ hosted their sixth annual Health & Wellness Summit in September. This event featured expert speakers, panels, workshops and interactive activities to provide support and engage students, staff and faculty around wellness topics.
As part of a growing effort to incorporate wellness practices across the CU system, particularly for university employees, this year’s event featured speakers and presenters from multiple campuses. “This year, we wanted to highlight not just the research taking place on the CU ǸԹ campus… [but] that of our colleagues across the CU system. The opportunity to learn from and share with each other speaks to many of the dimensions of wellness that the summit aims to promote,” said Jess Morris, program director for Employee Wellness and Engagement at CU ǸԹ.
Here are a few highlights from this year’s event.
Employee Benefits and Wellness Fair
CU ǸԹ hosted an in-person Employee Benefits and Wellness Fair to share resources, services, programs, benefits and information related to faculty and staff well-being. Nearly 400 university employees circulated among booths featuring both campus and community vendors related to recreation, affinity and community groups, public health, assistance programs, employee benefits and more.
In addition to campus and community vendors, the fair featured hands-on experiences to help staff and faculty improve their well-being. Activities included yoga, flu shots, acupuncture, chair massages and meal kit distribution.
If you would like to learn more about community resources available to CU employees, visit theEmployee Benefits and Wellness Fairpage. Please note, this page also includes benefits and resources specific to CU ǸԹ employees.
Student Wellness Experience
To mirror the staff and faculty wellness fair, the summit also featured a Student Wellness Experience. Students were able to connect with resources on campus, try out new activities on campus and learn how to build sustainable wellness routines. Programs included F45, CrossFit, mindful painting, meditation sessions, yoga and more.
Campus Presentations
Colleagues from across the system shared research findings, training tools and information on a variety of wellness topics during the second day of the summit. Here are a few highlights from those presentations that ultimately drew nearly 500 in-person and virtual attendees.
If you would like to view the full schedule of presenters or watch recorded sessions, visit the Health & Wellness Summit website.
CU Anschutz
- Suicide Prevention Training for Student Populations
- A Storytelling Workshop to Build Personal Skills and Professional Success
- The Benefits and Practical Application of Heart-Focused Breathing
- Human Factors: Factors of Success
“I was honored to be a part of the Health & Wellness Summit. It is critical that we bring together diverse communities and interested parties from across all four campuses to talk about common concerns and identify best practices. I’m grateful that the team from ǸԹ made this happen and I’m hopeful that conversations from the summit will turn into solutions for all of our communities.”
– Matt Mishkind, PhD, deputy director of the Helen and Arthur E. Johnson Depression Center at CU Anschutz
UCCS
- Fitness Buddies: Supporting Enjoyment and Flourishing in Peer-led Physical Activity
- Population Resilience
- Understanding University Employee Health & Wellbeing
- Snapshot for the UCCS Integrative Care Model: How We Make It Work
“The CU Health and Wellness Summit provided a great opportunity to connect with colleagues from ǸԹ and Anschutz and learn about some of the amazing initiatives happening on all of our campuses. It takes a system-wide commitment to address the complex wellbeing needs of our communities; I am looking forward to additional collaborative efforts to help our students and employees thrive at CU.”
– Chrissie Bailey, assistant director of Wellness Promotion, UCCS
CU ǸԹ
- Understanding the Science of Happiness
- Dying to Talk ǸԹ Death: Identities, Challenges and Cultivating Best Practices to Increase Health & Wellness
- Nursing the Spirit: Care, Public Life and the Dignity of Vulnerable Strangers
- Single Living in a World Built for Two
- Intergenerational Trauma: Breaking the Cycle
- The Benefits of Identifying with a Disability
- The True Story of Zero Waste and Your Wellness
- How to Stop Harm Before it Happens: The Power of Early Intervention
“The day was refreshing, both personally and professionally. I appreciated the variety of presentations and even had trouble deciding between fascinating topics related to aspects of wellness. It was also wonderful to see long lost colleagues I had not seen since before COVID.”
– Meloni Rudolph Crawford, assistant vice chancellor for Student Health, Wellbeing and Advocacy, CU Denver