Getting a degree proves that a student has learned how to do a job but doesn’t prepare the students for the actual work environment. Every student comes from a different background, and most aren’t as wealthy and/or privileged enough to finish school without student loans or any other financial debt.

South Campus held a Student Well-Being Symposium on Feb. 14 for faculty and staff to discuss the importance of student wellness and ways to improve them.

“It’s OK not to be OK,” said UNT chief medical officer Dr. Jeff Beeson. “You can’t control the world around you. You can’t control what happens to you. You can only control how to respond to those things.”

In many cases, students are coming into the classrooms with baggage. They could be homeless, hungry or even tired from working night shifts and then coming to class the next morning.

In his presentation, Dr. Beeson revealed the wellness wheel. There are seven different dimensions in this wheel, including emotional, physical, mental, social, environmental, occupational and spiritual.

Even if only one applies to a student’s well-being, they should always be aware that the rest of the wheel exists because with one missing link, the wheel will not roll, Dr. Beeson said.

Emotional wellness is to understand one’s feelings and accepting one’s limitations and achieving emotional stability without limiting one’s self. Students who practice this will have the ability to overcome any difficult situation.

Physical wellness is when one is physically active, exercise, on a healthy diet, maintaining one’s recommended body weight, getting the right amount of sleep and avoiding drugs. Getting the right amount of sleep is difficult for most students with full-time jobs and/or are parents.

Mental wellness is intellectual wellness, the ability to apply the things you have learned and using the mind to interact with the world. Students can easily lose focus of this by forgetting what they have learned if not put into practice.

Social wellness is to keep a positive self-image, being confident and outgoing. This involves the interest of one’s self and their environment. Some students lack this, such as the students who stare into cell phone screens majority of the time with no face-to-face human interaction.

Environmental wellness is an action to protect the world around one’s lifestyle. This can be achieved by keeping one’s home and workplace clean and organized.

Occupational wellness is the ability to thrive on the job with rewards that are important to the individual. When working hard for a promotion, one should know that failing is a learning experience towards success.

Spiritual wellness is to have a sense of meaning and direction in life and the unselfish concern for others. Students who lack this could be uncertain what they want to do in life and what they should study.

Connect health instructor Christina Bigler teaches the wellness wheel to her students. Bigler said that one thing that most people struggle with is how open they want to be about their well-being.

“Wherever you are in life, this can shift and change,” she said.

South campus president Peter Jordan, who is also an Integrated Student Success Model leader, said that there are students with so many different setbacks in life.

When asked how could TCC help students with those problems, Jordan said they will direct students to campus’ food pantries and locations of local shelters.