The diverse wellness ecosystem at Yale-NUS College

Participants make accessories from recycled plastic with the help of a trainer from Green Nudge. Photo provided by Chloe Ang Wei Ting (Class of 2024).

For Jody Lim Pei Xuan (Class of 2025), a day in the life as a Yale-NUS College student might consist of going through readings at noon, then taking a breather in the afternoon assembling accessories with recycled plastics.

This accessory-making session was just one of the many campus initiatives organised by the Yale-NUS Wellness Committee in the past semester. The Wellness Committee is part of the Student Affairs Office, and their goal is to foster a culture of balance, compassion, gratitude, and self-awareness in the student body and to enable the campus to be a healthy space for learning, playing, and living.

This semester, the Wellness team engaged the student body through a diverse range of activities and initiatives. Some of them included giving out free yoghurt bowls, teaching students simple massage techniques, and even engaging a professional nutritionist to offer personalised health consultations.

Participants make accessories from recycled plastic with the help of a trainer from Green Nudge. Photo provided by Chloe Ang Wei Ting (Class of 2024).

In March, the team also collaborated with social enterprise Green Nudge to explore how craft-making and sustainability can go hand in hand.

Said Jody about the workshop, “I think the crafting process was very therapeutic as it helped me get my mind off day-to-day worries. Making something with your hands and working with something small like beads felt relaxing because you simply need to focus on the task at hand and not think about anything else. Being able to get something out of this process was a bonus too!”

“To me, wellness [means] slowing down [our] pace of life, and having a fun crafting activity to focus on is very helpful [in achieving that].”

Other than organising activities on school grounds, the Wellness Committee also supported various trips off-campus as well. One of which was an excursion to the Art Science Museum for an exhibition themed around mental health. Students also had an opportunity to engage in the healing properties of nature via a fun kayaking trip on a weekday afternoon in March.

Students kayaking at Lower Seletar Reservoir Park. Photo provided by Joseph Goh (Class of 2024).

According to one of the participants, Joseph Goh (Class of 2024), the kayaking adventure was a good respite from the busy school term. Said Joseph, “There was [a moment where] we all laid back on the kayak and enjoyed the silence for a good ten minutes. That felt really serene.”

These exciting and diverse once-off activities form just a part of the larger student support landscape at Yale-NUS. The Wellness Committee has also been attentive to provide physical spaces to rest and unwind, especially during the busy finals period. At the end of the school term every semester, the Committee curates the sensory room, which features therapeutic activities and massage chairs for students to relax and engage with their five senses.

The sensory room last semester featured massage chairs, take-home slime, and free toys for destressing. Photo provided by Jae Mak (Class of 2025).

Complementing the wellness events on campus is also P.S. (Peer Support) We Care — a student organisation that started in 2013. Trained in active listening and providing a confidential, non-directive, and non-judgmental space, the peer counsellors seek to be a complement to the College’s professional counselling services.

“At P.S. We Care, we believe in creating a safe space for the Yale-NUS community to share, talk and confide in. We believe that the training we do each semester on being a better listener goes beyond shifts: our peer counsellors help to cultivate a culture of care on campus,” shared the executive committee of P.S. We Care.

On top of hosting regular weekly peer counselling shifts and team meetings, P.S. We Care also occasionally organises wider events to engage the wider community. Past events included an art jam session, a picnic at Saga, and running booths during Sexual Awareness Week.

Committed to expanding their service to the student community, the team ran a first responder training with AWARE Singapore, a not-for-profit group leading women’s rights and gender equality advocacy group, for peer counsellors at the end of the semester.

The peer counsellors of P.S. We Care attend workshops to acquire relevant skills to provide timely mental health support for their peers. Photo provided by Jae Mak (Class of 2025).

Overall, Yale-NUS Student Wellness Manager Cheryl Tan sees wellness as all-encompassing. “By prioritising wellness for ourselves, we hope to create a community where students feel empowered to thrive in all aspects of their lives — from their academic pursuits to their personal relationships and beyond. When we take care of ourselves, we are better equipped to navigate the challenges of university and beyond, pursue our passions, and thrive.”