This news post is more than one year old and has been retained for archive purposes. The information below may no longer be relevant.
Welcome back, Ravens! The Office of Student Affairs (OSA) is excited to welcome you all back to our lovely campus!
It is a time of many new experiences and opportunities for you to seek out and connect with peers! With so much going on, we thought it was important to share with you some information about the Umbrella Project harm reduction strategy and some supports that might be helpful to you!
At Carleton, we promote the concept of substance use health. Much like mental health, your relationship with substances can impact and is impacted by other factors of your physical, social and mental wellness. Being mindful about the choices we make around using substances can help lead to better overall wellness and reduce risk of harm.
Harm reduction is one way we can achieve this! It is an umbrella term for measures, practices, and approaches that aim to reduce the harms to persons, families and communities caused by substance use. Harm reduction can also be seen in more everyday activities like wearing a seat belt, bike helmet, or applying sunscreen before a day at the beach. It involves being aware of the risks our actions might have and taking steps to be safer. When we talk about substance use, harm reduction can look like making sure to stay hydrated, avoiding using substances alone, or making sure to start slow when using a substance for the first time.
For more info about substance use health, the Umbrella Project, and some easy to implement harm reduction strategies please visit the newly updated Wellness website.
Before we sign off we want to share two important resources here on campus for students questioning or struggling to maintain positive substance use health.
All People All Pathways (APAP) is our weekly peer support meeting for students. The student meetings take place Thursdays from 12:00 p.m. to 1:00 p.m. via Zoom. These meetings are facilitated by volunteers with personal experience with substance use and addiction. APAP is drop in, confidential and does not require abstinence to participate. It is open to folks who may be questing their use, looking to make a change, or experiencing problematic use. It is also open to people supporting a friend or family member with substance use challenges and provides a non-judgmental, safe environment for those seeking help to ask questions, free from stigma, alienation or discrimination.
It is also important highlight the overdose prevention efforts here on campus. Concentrated forms of opioids such as fentanyl and carfentanil have been found in the Ottawa drug supply and incidents of overdose have been on the rise during Covid-19. Naloxone is a potentially life saving intervention that is low risk and can temporarily reverse the effects of an opioid overdose. Carleton has partnered with NaloxoneCare to offer free virtual Naloxone training to students and staff, after which participants can receive a Narcan kit in the mail. The next training session is at 2:00 p.m. on Monday, September 19. Register for the Naloxone training session here.
For more information about Carleton’s overdoes prevention efforts, including the location of our Naloxone emergency boxes on campus please visit our opioid information page.
We hope you are enjoying your time on campus and keep an eye out here and on @CarletonWellness Instagram for more tips and resources!
Thursday, September 8, 2022 in Campus Life, News, Wellness
Share: Twitter, Facebook
More News Posts
Ask Me