An academic from Electronics and Computer Science has come up with her own response to life under lockdown with a new Teams site designed to answer staff and student questions about wellbeing.
Professor m.c. schraefel says:
“Whenever we change anything – stress happens. We’ve all been experiencing multiple changes to say the least – even if we are experienced with working at home, few of us will have done that with a pandemic, a national lockdown and with a change in business practices and ambiguity around so many life and work issues.
“Combine that with the fact that few of us have the knowledge, skills and practice specifically about wellbeing or resilience, so there’s a need to help folks rapidly access options that don’t add to stress.”
The Teams site, ‘we’re working out – while working from home’, already has 91 members. The main focus are the twice weekly video presentations: ‘Ten at Two’ on Tuesdays and Thursdays. The idea is to have ten minutes to go over a topic of interest to the team and use that to help dig deeper. So far Professor schraefel has covered: ‘What is being hangry?’; ‘What is food for?’ and ’How water, the gut and the brain connect for wellbeing’. Visit this special channel on Teams, if you have a topic you want covered.
Professor schraefel, a certified strength and conditioning coach, nutritionist and functional neurologist, runs many of the sessions herself but if there’s a question outside her domain, she says she will try and find an appropriate expert response.
As m.c explains, the initiative will feed into her University research:
“A key question in my work is how does interactive technology need to be designed to support health and wellbeing – in particular – how do we design technology to empower us to be able to take care of ourselves.
“In other words, my work wants to help everyone to be able to answer the questions: (1) how do you feel? and (2) what can you do to help yourself feel better?”
You can find out more about m.c.’s research here.
m.c. invites everyone to join the ‘we’re working out – while working from home’ Teams site and share their health and wellbeing questions and experiences.
Health and Wellbeing has provided a range of advice for staff including team resilience, guidance for vulnerable adults, setting up your home workstation and maintaining positive wellbeing whilst working from home.
