Wellness Week at Winsor

The Wellness Department is charting a new course for health and wellness at Winsor, weaving together curriculum, events, speakers, and resources to best support students’ mental, physical, and intellectual health. This week, the Wellness Club extended the community conversation on wellness and equity through a one-week wellness takeover. During this week, a number of events and activities touched upon themes of health, self-care, mind-body wellness, and related topics.

An in-person yoga session kicked off the week (pictured). Other activities included a discussion analyzing the constructs of beauty and effects on mental health. 

Emily Monteiro, part-time counselor, led Class III and Class IV through some games to highlight all of the reasons a student might go talk to a counselor. The Wellness Club led an Upper School meeting where each student responded to the prompts "How have the beauty standards in your culture contributed to your sense of self? What have you grappled with while trying to find self-love?" 

On Wednesday, the Wellness Club brought the fun to an Upper School lunch with candy, a selfie-frame, and music. Love Your Selfie Day, with a focus on self-love and positive body image, was a pre-pandemic anticipated event. This year, it returned so students can better understand definitions of beauty, celebrate each other, and uncover strategies for self-care.
 

On Thursday, coloring and journaling took over the Virginia Wing Library and at LOC tables. Thursday also included an Assembly with a return of speaker Darryl Bellamy for more Fearless Moments. He reminded students that “Fearless moments are when you have fear, nervousness, butterflies, worry, anxiety, and you ACT. Today is a celebration of your fearless moments and a celebration of Wellness Week.”

On Friday, students passed out flyers for the menstrual product drive and talked about period poverty, pink tax, and current legislation to regulate materials in menstrual products. Nora Furlong ’25 organized the drive in collaboration with the Wellness Club. Nora learned about menstrual justice in Ms. Joy McLaurin’s ’12 health class last year, and went on to become an ambassador for the Pad Project (https://thepadproject.org/educate/). Furlong meets monthly on zoom with other ambassadors from around the world. She is a wealth of knowledge on fighting for menstrual equity and this initiative is making an impact in the Winsor community. We look forward to sharing more about Furlong's work.