SLDP Project Groups 2022

Learn about the amazing projects that our SLDP students did through our program! Their utilization of integrated skills from our essential leadership seminars resulted in several powerful campus-focused group projects.

Elastic Minds In this time of crisis, we face more complex challenges than ever before, gradually letting our bodies and minds become exhausted. This group (Benny, Jeremy, Priya, and Yuqing) created their project with the goal of bringing students an easier way to bring their minds back to life.  The group created and facilitated a series of four workshops during the 2022 Spring Quarter that were focused on well-being. The workshops made students' minds more stress-resistant with some tips from positive psychology, with topics of expressing gratitude, self-adjusting breathing, building self esteem, and developing a growth mindset. The group hopes that those who need help will feel a touch of warmth from their project.
The Food Heroes This group (Gurtaj, Emma, Anshu, and Damon) was creating during Winter 2022. The group wanted to focus on providing resources and information to students at UC Davis about eco-friendly activities available to them on campus and at home during their own time. They focused on sharing their information through an Instagram page (@ucd_foodheroes) in order to cut back on paper waste as well as to keep the information up for future generations of students. By providing free and accessible information while cutting back on physical wastage, the group hoped to inspire other students to pursue positive habits regarding what they are passionate about.
Insights into Mental Health and Financial Instability This project, spearheaded by Jinguang, Claire, and Rain, was intended to survey the UC Davis student population, asking about their own experiences with financial instability and its impact on mental health, as well as encouraging students to contemplate how to help these marginalized groups. The team conducted a literature review into the documented intersections of mental health and financial instability, but wanted more qualitative information about what students in our community struggle with day-to-day. These same students would offer the best advice on how to help similarly affected students, which is what the group aimed to interrogate during their surveying. Through their project, they were able to evaluate the factors that contribute to these struggles as well as how to address them–and they plan to report these findings to organizations on campus that deal with one factor or another, so that they can appeal to these groups more effectively.
M.I.N.D. Revival The M.I.N.D Revival project (Gustavo and Kaylee) centered around mental wellness and preventive care. They continued the UNMUTED Podcast series, originally established by a 2021 SLDP group, to develop a second season focused on discussing healthy maintainable habits that positively impact your overall wellbeing. The pair discussed habits such as sleep, eating, and exercise from the perspective of busy college students. Their goal is for students to learn how to create maintainable habits, that don’t feel like a chore, in order to become and stay mentally and emotionally healthy.  You can listen to their podcast here: Unmuted Podcast - YouTube.
One Health The purpose of the One Health project group (Alvin, Desiree, Lizbeth, and Suba) was to bridge the gap between students and resources available for them on campus.  Their mission was to have faculty implement a resource handout in their syllabus, ensuring that students have a starting point when they need to consult campus resources.  The group reached out to campus organizations and staff to share their idea and created a suggested handout that could be used on a syllabus with resources and contact information for students. Their hope is that in the future, this resource can be updated each quarter for use and that it or a similar resource be a required component on syllabi and/or on Canvas sites.