The Center for Health Education and Wellness (CHEW) promotes the idea of “Be Healthy Be Happy” on The University of Scranton campus. A majority of those involved in CHEW are students, besides three full-time staff members, which makes it very student-based. 

We spoke with Cory Frievald ‘20, who has been on CHEW’s Peer Health Education (PHE) team for three years and has led the team for two of those years. Read below to hear her take on CHEW’s mission, what CHEW does and what University students can look forward to when it comes to CHEW.

CHEW is a group on campus that runs late night and health campaigns. PHE members are often on campus promoting what CHEW does. 

The CHEW Peer Health Educators (PHEs)

If you have ever been on campus and seen people giving out quarter sheets, giveaways or hosting table sits — those are PHE educators.

“(We) make sure everyone on campus is healthy, happy and informed!” Frievald said.

CHEW works toward promoting health and wellness while also representing Scranton’s mission.

“CHEW focuses on the Jesuit philosophy of cura personalis, or care of the whole person. One of our favorite phrases is “Be Healthy Be Happy.” The CHEW office provides information and support for our students, faculty, and staff to help them form good habits to lead healthy and balanced lives,” Frievald said.

In order to exercise its mission on campus, CHEW hosts events to get students excited about health and wellness while also informing them about important topics.

PHE working the Glow & Dough CHEW event.

The most recent event CHEW hosted was on Saturday, Feb. 29, which was called Glow & Dough.

“(It was) a late night event that featured a free yoga class by Yoga West on 4th TDC as well as rounds of trivia and free Jitty Joe’s cookie dough on 1st TDC,” Frievald said.

Another one of CHEW’s events, the annual fitness challenge, is at its halfway mark.

“For our annual fitness challenge, over 1,000 students and staff have committed to complete at least three weeks of 150 minutes of exercise. If they successfully complete the challenge they will get a free dri-fit T-shirt!” Frievald said.

The event tends to be a great success and gets a lot of students active and excited about exercise. As for future events, CHEW has a few health campaigns coming up.

“HPV awareness day is March 4, and we will be going around campus in an effort to raise awareness about HPV prevention and vaccination. Spring break and parade day are upon us soon after, and our PHE team will be educating peers about how to avoid binge drinking if they do choose to drink during St. Patrick’s day festivities or over spring break,” Frievald said.

CHEW PHEs promoting their most recent event, Glow & Dough, on campus.

Frievald loves being part of CHEW because of the people she gets to work with while working hard to promote important topics.

“I love the community! Everyone is super friendly and wants to encourage each other to live well. I’ve met a ton of people I wouldn’t have otherwise, and they’ve all inspired me to work harder and try new things,” Frievald said when asked her favorite things about being part of CHEW.

If you think this sounds like a great group to be part of, you can apply to CHEW today.

“Applications are out and are due by March 6. We look for students of any major that are passionate about health and wellness and want to help make our campus a better place!” Frievald said.

Click here to apply to CHEW and click here to learn more information about CHEW itself.