Name: Books and Fidgets and Stuffies, Oh My!: Get Hands-On with Wellness
Start: 2025-06-12T13:15:00-0400
End: 2025-06-12T14:35:00-0400

You will be able to validate your attendance (Check-In to sessions) using your personal schedule.

Thursday June 12, 2025 1:15pm - 2:35pm EDT

Ballroom 3, Pastides Alumni Center @ 900 Senate Street, Columbia, SC 29201

Recognizing a rise in mental health concerns among college students, employees at a university library searched for ways to destigmatize mental illness and support mental health on campus. These efforts opened the door to broader conversations about student employee wellness, neurodiversity, and faculty/staff wellbeing. This session will cover the library's different initiatives including a book collection, wellness kits, and outreach and partnerships across campus and the community. In this interactive experience, attendees will get hands-on with sensory toys, weighted stuffed animals, and meditation tools in a wellness kit petting zoo. Then, the founder of an arts-based suicide-prevention organization will lead a watercolor painting mini-workshop. Come get creative and explore opportunities to support student, faculty, and staff wellbeing at your library!

Moderator: Allison Read, USC Upstate

Presenters

John Siegel

Coordinator of Library Instructional Services, USC Upstate

John Siegel joined USC Upstate in July 2018 as Coordinator of Library Instructional Services. He serves as librarian for community health, exercise science, nursing, physical education, and women’s and gender studies. His professional interests include meeting the needs of diverse... Read More →