Creating Community: Building & Sustaining Wellness among Students/Postdocs

Join us for an afternoon dedicated to building and celebrating a community of care to promote mental health and wellness among UCSF’s graduate students and postdoctoral scholars. Self-care and seeking help for mental wellness are at a heightened state for members of the community, and especially among individuals from historically marginalized and underserved populations in health science. This event will be an opportunity for members of the UCSF campus community to build allyship and foster a stronger sense of belonging.

Tuesday, April 11, 2023 at UCSF Mission Bay from 2:00 p.m. to 6:00 p.m.

Please REGISTER by April 7, 2023. The keynote address will be open to all members of the UCSF community and will be followed by interactive sessions for graduate students and postdocs throughout the afternoon.

Please bring your UCSF ID to scan in at the check-in table. Masking indoors is strongly recommended.

Schedule Overview

1:30 - 2:00 p.m. Check in, Genentech Atrium

2:00 - 3:30 p.m. Keynote, Byers Auditorium

3:35 - 4:00 p.m. Snack Break, Genentech Atrium

4:00 - 4:40 p.m. Plant Art Workshop, GEN-N114

4:45 - 5:25 p.m. Self-Compassion and Shame Session, GEN-N114

4:00 - 5:25 - Drop in Decompression Room, GEN-S271

5:30- 5:45 p.m. Guided Group Meditation, Byers Auditorium

5:45- 6:00 p.m. Final Remarks and Rest is Resistance Book Giveaway, Byers Auditorium

Keynote

Speaker: Adisa Anderson, PhD | Psychologist, University of California, Berkeley

Honoring the Past, Centering the Present Mental Wellness, and Building Resilience for the Future

In this keynote address, Dr. Anderson will:

• explore how our history impacts our mental health and wellness

• unify as a community to heal from feelings of helplessness, isolation, and powerlessness

• build and strengthen a greater sense of belonging

• identify strategies to enhance coping and resiliency

Afternoon Sessions (3)

1. Plant Art Workshop

Genentech N114

This is a 40-min workshop that will prompt participants to reflect on meaning we give to individual and collective experiences in our lives can encourage us to identify ways overcome challenging situations and embrace empowering experiences given one’s intersecting identities as health professionals. We will draw from narrative therapy efforts and use plants, pots, canvases, and paint to explore affirming images, words, or quotes to explore empowering individual and community-based narratives/stories of empowerment/affirmation.

2. Self-Compassion: Resisting the Lure of Shame

Genentech N114

Shame is a distressing emotion that can lead us to feel isolated, inadequate and overwhelmed. In this interactive and experiential workshop led by SHCS Psychologists Dr. Justin Gibson and Dr. Alexandra Thurston, learn how self-compassion offers a powerful inner resource to transform shame and reclaim our fundamental truth - that we are enough, just as we are.

3. Decompression Room

Genentech S271

The decompression space is there if you need it, in order to take a break throughout the day. If you'd like to practice silently some of the meditation practices you've learned or if you'd like to just sit quietly, the decompression space is there for you.

This wellness event is co-sponsored by the Graduate Division and Student Health and Counseling Services. It is funded by the 2023 UCSF Community Wellbeing Grant.

UCSF is committed to providing accessible and inclusive programming to all participants. To request a reasonable accommodation for this event, please contact Jessica Ip at jessica.ip@ucsf.edu by Monday, April 3, 2023.