Using creativity to cancel out stress with SCAD Counseling
Photos courtesy of SCAD Counseling and Student Support Services
It’s only at SCAD where seeing the Pizza Fairy is a sign of sanity and stability. It means you have survived long enough to be rewarded with a slice of pizza, straight from the oven. It’s also a sign that it’s midterms or finals week, a time when people begin pulling both all-nighters and their hair to get the work done.
The Pizza Fairy is one of the signature stress management events held by the Counseling and Student Support Services at SCAD. Some of the other popular events include the Donut Divas, Dog Therapy and Midnight Breakfast, which was held at the Hive last night.
“A lot of our outreach [programs] tend to have the surprise element,” said Tamara Knapp-Grosz, the director of Counseling and Student Support Services. “The goal is to change the energy of the building. If people are stressed out and working really hard, we want to surprise them with something fun and different and get people laughing.”
The Support Services also offers general stress management workshops held at Bradley Hall. These workshops are smaller and can range from two students to a group of 15. According to Knapp-Grosz, there’s a good mixture of freshmen, sophomores, juniors, seniors and graduates.
Some workshops include accutapping and meditation. “I think it’s important for people to learn different managements of stress because what’s going to work for one person is going to be different for the next,” explained Knapp-Grosz. “And sometimes when you do something that doesn’t work, you need something else to be your back-up.”
If students are too busy to drop in at Bradley, the counseling services come to them through programs such as Brain Breakers, which is new this year. It’s a surprise program that professors can request for their students.
“Basically what we do is that we come in between classes and have a quick break to energize the students and get them active,” explained Knapp-Grosz. “They might have a limbo contest or hula-hoops or the hokey pokey. Silly kinds of things that make people laugh but they get them up and moving.”
“It was funny, a professor in Arnold Hall has asked us for a Brain Breaker but she gave us the wrong room number,” Knapp-Grosz added. “[The Brain Breakers] went into a classroom that had not been requested but the professor loved it [anyway] and the students loved it, too.”
Another program includes a birthday party. “We’ll surprise a building with a birthday party that’s related to their major. We just did one at the Equestrian Center. But we’ve celebrated Pacman’s birthday and Charles Schultz’s birthday over the Sequential Arts department.”
“Most colleges don’t do that kind of thing so we’re more known for that creative aspect,” she adds. Knapp-Grosz will be going to Puerto Rico in December to teach a college’s counseling service about some of the stress management events done at SCAD.
Knapp-Grosz also suggested smaller techniques to help manage stress such as taking quick breaks, eating healthy and sleeping.
“It’s part of the SCAD culture to pull these all-nighters,” she said. While students think it helps them, it actually worsens their situation. “You really want to get that regular sleep so you can focus and get your work done and be more creative. That will take less time to get their work done.”
As for energy drinks, “those are horrible. They impact your ability to focus and concentrate. It’s things like these that we think are going to help us but they actually don’t. when you eat junk food, it spikes your blood sugar, which affects your ability to focus,” she said.
“What we try to do is just let students know that counseling is not just for when you’re depressed,” Knapp-Grosz added. “It’s also a preventive thing. It’s about learning the skills that are going to help you when difficult times come because that’s just part of life.”
For more information about Counseling and Student Support Services, visit their Facebook page.
