A hidden gem of Athens, WellWorks offers services to OU employees, people of Athens, graduate students and some undergraduate students.
Located in Grover Center, 53 Richland Ave e124, WellWorks offers programs to promote well-being such as wellness coaching, nutrition counseling, massage therapy and more.
Being a one-stop wellness center, WellWorks staff had to work on transitioning to a virtual platform over the course of the past year. The virtual platform has opened up opportunities to students, including undergraduate, to find the well-being sources they need amid COVID-19. These programs provide guidance on how to incorporate well-being aspects like fitness, mindfulness and nutrition into everyday life.
“We really work particularly with wellness coaching, but a lot of our programming is to help people identify what their goals are,” Annie Laurie Cadmus, the engagement and marketing coordinator of WellWorks, said. “There are too many wellness goals in the world to say that you want them all, so you have to choose what's important to you. Then how can we help you find the resources that are going to help you and empower you to meet the goals that you've identified.”
Working closely with human resources, WellWorks has created a program called Healthy OHIO. WellWorks has worked hard to make sure employees from all across OU’s campus are receiving information on the possibilities and benefits WellWorks has to offer.
WellWorks is all about bettering oneself and improving in the areas they want. They are there to help their members enhance what’s already great about them. It’s not about living up to a certain standard or becoming the best, but it’s about facilitating an environment that’s supportive and empowers people to live their lives.
Approachability is of the utmost importance to the employees of WellWorks. The accessibility of the online platform has also built a foundation for relationships.
“I've talked to employees who have their best friends live across the country, and now they can take fitness classes with their best friends again,” Cadmus said. “It's like being in college again, they said, because now they have this opportunity to connect with people all over the country. We're not limiting it to anyone, at this point, as long as you have access to internet, you can access our resources. It just opens people up to exploring well being in a different way.”
Due to COVID-19, WellWorks had to transition to their online platform and it was a learning curve for everyone involved.
“It was tough just because I was so used to being able to talk to people in person — give instruction in person,” Lynsey Booker, an OU graduate and former student employee at WellWorks, said. “It caused me to have to be adaptable. But other than that, I felt that it was as smooth as it could be. I think that it was just something that everybody was learning from every day.”
Although the change was challenging, it led to accessibility and consistency during uncertain times, both Cadmus and Booker said.
As for online, the staff hopes there will be a wider variety of programming in the future. There are live, recorded fitness classes, online videos for mindfulness and nutrition, PDFs about different recipes and kitchen hacks and more. There’s also a wellness coaching series, a kickboxing series, and a balance and core fitness series.
“Almost all of our operations went virtual,” Jennifer Bennett, executive director of Wellbeing, said. “We started doing virtual group fitness — we also were able to do some virtual nutrition. We also were able to do some education and self guided videos for things like recovery, like what does active recovery mean and look like ... I did some videos on how to decide what to do when you're doing behavior changes that you want to make and how to improve your sleep hygiene. We dabbled in lots of different things from coloring pages and journaling prompts.”
There’s also a risk reduction program where individuals that have a health risk can learn more about how to help reduce that risk through a 12-week program.
WellWorks staff works to make sure they offer a professional environment for their student employees. Students are constantly learning business techniques, how to adapt in the workplace and develop new programming.
“I started off at the front desk and then transitioned over to a personal trainer as well but the front desk is where I met all the clients — all the regulars are awesome,” Cole Casillas, student manager for the wellness specialists at WellWorks, said. “Sometimes they come in and talk to you for an hour and work out for 30 minutes — and then come back and talk for another hour. It's an awesome connection to professors and the community. Then personal training is awesome … you can make great connections from either one, I'd say.”
There is also a Culture in Action (CIA) program which deals with microaggression in the workplace towards women. This program helps employees in the workplace to identify what is and isn’t acceptable to be said in the workplace.
“We got someone from Diversity and Inclusion, The Women's Center and Bystander Intervention and they put together a program for us,” Bennett said. “And then we did it for every student at our last in-person orientation. We talked about microaggressions and unconscious bias that happen uniquely in the fitness center but also happen outside.”
Another part of WellWorks is HeartWorks: a cardiovascular and pulmonary rehabilitation center. WellWorks has a team that works over with HeartWorks and they have a full time staff that does educational programs, including stress management and healthy eating with a WellWorks dietician. There is also a clinical nurse as well as an exercise physiologist there full time.
Bennett, Cadmus, Casillas and Booker have all been able to grow through WellWorks and hope others take advantage of the healthy living lifestyle choices WellWorks can help them accomplish.
“The goal that I have is to build a community where people feel comfortable — welcome and understand that it's a journey, and we’re all just at different spots in our journey,” Bennett said.
