Student Health Services

The Health Promotion Department at Student Health Services is dedicated to educating students and to providing information regarding a wide variety of health issues. Below are descriptions of the various topics that are covered by Health Promotion. If you would like to have someone from Health Promotion come to your location (residence hall, community, class, etc.) to give a presentation, facilitate a discussion, or provide health education materials, please complete the online Request a Program form. For preparation and planning purposes, please make your request at least two weeks in advance.

Alcohol and Other Drugs

This program focuses on helping students identify negative and harmful consequences of high-risk alcohol use. It acknowledges that abstinence from alcohol is the safest option but not always the most acceptable choice for students. Thus the program focuses on harm reduction as opposed to a “just say no” approach.  The presenters approach this topic in a fun, interactive, positive, and intellectually stimulating manner.

Diversity and Health

This presentation focuses on health and social justice. Topics can include health disparities, health and healing across cultures, worldview, differences in help-seeking behaviors and privilege.

Every1: General Education About Sexual Assault (student presenters)

The Every1 Sexual Violence Prevention and Education peer educators provide a 60-minute session on the dynamics of familiar assault. Components of this program include consent, alcohol, and how to support a friend who has experienced an assault.

Every1: Healthy Relationships (student presenters)

This interactive presentation focuses on the components of healthy and unhealthy relationships, and how to support a friend who is in an unhealthy one.

Exercise/Fitness

This program covers the fundamentals of exercise, and offers tips on how individuals can initiate or increase their own physical activity. (The Department of Recreational Sports also offers outreach presentations related to exercise and fitness. Learn more about customized group fitness classes at http://oregonstate.edu/recsports/customized-group-fitness-classes.)

General Wellness

This presentation goes over the dimensions of health and focuses on the topics that have the biggest impact on academic performance, including alcohol use, exercise, healthy eating, time/stress management, and sexual health.

LGBT Health

This program provides an overview of the health concerns specific to lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender communities. Topics covered include mental health, cancer risks, STI rates, and barriers to healthcare access and service equality.

Mental Health: Depression/Anxiety

This presentation looks at the causes of depression and anxiety, and how they can hinder daily life. Topics include behavioral strategies to help manage anxiety and depression, and the campus resources available to students.

Mental Health: Stress Reduction/Time Management

This presentation provides an overview of the academic impact of stress and its physical and emotional effects upon the body. Discussion centers on identifying the warning signs of persistent stress, management strategies, benefits and barriers to managing stress, campus resources available for students to utilize, and exercises to counteract the effects of stress.

Nutrition: Avoiding Stress Eating

This program addresses the body’s response to stress, eating pattern changes due to stress, strategies to avoid negative eating habits due to stress, and effective ways to cope with unavoidable stress.

Nutrition: Benny’s Best Bets for Good College Health

Eating habits often change in the first year of college. This program discusses the importance of good nutrition for academic and life success, and offers Benny’s tips to achieve stellar nutrition. 

Nutrition: Body Image

This program is an engaging discussion about body image, self esteem and the media’s influence on how we feel about ourselves. Students will leave with a more positive feeling about themselves and their bodies.

Nutrition: Diabetes 101

Interested in learning about diabetes and why it’s growing at such a rapid rate, especially in young people? This interactive program is for you! Learn how to manage diabetes, but more importantly, how to prevent it by leading a healthy lifestyle.

Nutrition: Healthy Eating on a Budget

Want to eat healthy but always feel like money is a stretch? This talk is for you! Ways to make your dollar stretch, along with budgeting basics and helpful tips for navigating the grocery store on a budget.

Nutrition: MyPlate and You

Healthy eating made easy: USDA’s new MyPlate diagram allows one to optimize their nutrition by following an easy, user-friendly diagram. This program will investigate ways to optimize the health of each of the food group components along with strategies for fitting this food model into everyday life.

Nutrition: Portion Distortion

Over the past 30 years the proportion of obese Americans has doubled. This talk examines the trend of increased portion sizes and its potential relationship to the weight problem in America today.  Also discusses ways to reduce portion sizes without going hungry.

Sexual Health: Men’s Health (MARS student presenters)

This is a safer sex/contraception presentation with a focus on men’s issues.

Sexual Health: Negotiating Safer Sex

This interactive presentation briefly covers safer sex/contraception and then focuses on helping students negotiate healthy sexual communication.

Sexual Health: Safer Sex/Contraception

This interactive presentation covers the definition of sex, the risk continuum, STI’s, risk reduction strategies, and contraception with a focus on condom use.

Sexual Health: Sexversations ®

A card game designed to encourage dialogue around various sexual health issues.

Sexual Health: Women’s Health

This is a safer sex/contraception program with a focus on women’s issues.