UC Cross Enroll Course Highlight: PHRMSCI 42

By Adriana Conte

April 6, 2021 at 6:21 p.m.

Maintaining a healthy lifestyle while in college is easier said than done. From sleepless nights to heightened stress, it can be difficult to follow the same healthy practices at school as at home. Self care is a very important aspect of a healthy lifestyle that is too often overlooked in the fast-paced nature of college life. However, navigating stress and adopting healthy practices is vital to both personal wellbeing and academic success. UC Cross Enroll is excited to promote Life101: a course offered through UC Irvine that encourages the comprehensive wellbeing of college students and demonstrates the power and importance of embracing a healthy lifestyle. This truly unique, interdisciplinary course will provide students with resources and evidence-based knowledge to implement into their everyday lives. 

 

Life101 is taught by Dr. Mahtab Jafari from the UC Irvine School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences. In her research lab, the focus of her work is on improving healthspan using fruit flies as her model system and in her educational research in classrooms, she focuses on preventive medicine and how a balanced lifestyle can add years to the human lifespan. She aims to use her research to help students challenge their stressors head-on and learn to better manage them in order to achieve a well-rounded lifestyle. 

 

“Without a healthy mind and body, it is impossible to be successful–personally and professionally,” Dr. Jafari says. “Academic institutions focus mainly on academic achievements without paying attention to the ongoing epidemic of stress. We need to change this mindset.” 

 

Spanning psychology, physiology, sociology, and more, Life101 is designed for students of any major at any UC campus. The learning materials are intended to help students think critically about how they can achieve a healthy lifestyle and make them actively want to make health a priority in their lives. Dr. Jafari recognizes that this can be especially difficult in the online learning environment; that’s why this course seeks to connect students from across all UC campuses to share their diverse life experiences and inspire each other to achieve their health goals. 


UC Cross Enroll

PHRSCI 142: Life 101

“Without a healthy mind and body, it is impossible to be successful–personally

and professionally,”

Dr. Mahtab Jafari

Life 101 Instructor

Prerequisites:

enthusiasm to learn, to question, and to be open to change!

Course Content:

think critically about how they can achieve a healthy lifestyle and make them actively want to make health a priority in their lives.

enhance their own wellbeing through forming new relationships with students across the UC campuses and creating an uplifting

community that champions health and wellbeing.

covering the science of adopting good habits and better sleep to helping students manage their personal finances, this

course is useful and purposeful for anyone, regardless of major.

“In the new online learning environment, the greatest challenge to students lies in the lack of social interactions–no matter how much online interactions we can provide via email or discussion boards,” Dr. Jafari says.

 

Life101 takes the concept of online learning and turns it into an exciting, enriching academic experience. Students enhance their own wellbeing through forming new relationships with students across the UC campuses and creating an uplifting community that champions health and wellbeing. From covering the science of adopting good habits and better sleep to helping students manage their personal finances, this course is useful and purposeful for anyone, regardless of major. The only prerequisites required to enroll are an enthusiasm to learn, to question, and to be open to change. Upon successful completion of this course, students will be able to both recognize and implement healthy habits into their everyday lives, including but not limited to healthy eating, physical exercise, stress management techniques, and self-care. This knowledge will allow students to feel empowered and prepared to enhance their overall health and wellbeing both throughout the remainder of their college years and beyond. 

Instruction will occur entirely online through pre-recorded presentation modules. Students will view the presentations (about 3 10-15 minute video segments per topic), answer embedded questions, and participate in the self-reflection exercises in the videos. After watching all the video segments, students will complete a quiz to test understanding of the materials and participate in an online discussion forum to engage with classmates. Life101 is meant to be a stress-free course, therefore grading will be based only on the aforementioned tasks in addition to a pre and post-course reflective survey and a course evaluation. Students should expect to devote about two hours per week to this class in order to get the most out of their experience. Please refer to the course syllabus for more information about course expectations and learning outcomes. 

 

Life101 is the perfect course for students looking to learn how to lead a healthier lifestyle in college and beyond. If you’re looking to enhance your wellbeing and actively work towards developing healthy habits, this is the class for you! Enrollment is open, so reserve your seat in this truly one-of-a-kind class through UC Cross Enroll today! 

 

 

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