Students/staff/faculties of SHP will be offered to participate in the SKY Breath Happiness workshop followed by participating in a research program designed to study the potential effectiveness of the SKY Breath Happiness Program as a stress-management, resilience building wellness tool in this population. They will be given an informed consent form to sign if they choose to participate in the study. The course that the students are enrolled in is the SKY program, which is an evidence-based bio-psycho-social program that utilizes a multi-dimensional relationship between biology and behavior. It utilizes a unique set of standardized breathing techniques to rapidly reduce neuro-endocrine stress responses and the autonomic imbalance due to sympathetic overdrive, thus restoring autonomic homeostasis. These are interwoven with coping and stressor appraisal strategies, and simple stretching exercises. Classes will be 3 hours long on each of three consecutive days, and participants must be willing to attend all three sessions. There will also be one mandatory one hour follow-up session one week later. Participants will be asked to engage in daily 10 to 25 minute home resilience practice sessions performed five days per week. To support participants stabilization of the practices, optional daily guided practice will be offered online at a determined convenient time for all participants to allow full participation. The breathing techniques will be taught by certified instructors.
The main objective of this study is to evaluate the impact of a well-being program, SKY Campus Happiness, on well-being of students, faculties, and staff working/studying at School of Health Professional (SHP). SHP is leaning on the SKY Campus Happiness (SKY) program which is an integrative workshop format that includes both skill-building and group dynamics and may be critical for the effectiveness of the program. SKY is a university leadership and well-being program (campushappiness.org) that includes stress-management and tools for psychological resilience: yoga postures, breathing exercises, a breath-based meditation technique [Sudarshan Kriya Yoga]. SKY also includes positive psychology skills (e.g., gratitude, social connection, acts of kindness, meaning and purpose). In addition, the curriculum includes discussion and application of leadership skills and service learning. Relying on existing evidence of previous studies, we hypothesize that participating in this program will increase the well-being of people involved.