This fall student teams joined the BUild Lab’s community impact challenge, Wellbeing: Reimagined, Renewed, Revitalized Challenge, where they were tasked with developing project or venture ideas that promote social, emotional and/or physical wellbeing in their communities at BU and beyond. Eleven teams were chosen as finalists and will each receive a $500 seed grant to help them launch the project.

On Thursday, October 18, the finalists showcased their ideas and gave one-minute pitches for a chance to win an audience favorite award. Amor Plantae won audience favorite and were awarded an extra $500 for their venture idea.

Meet the Finalists:

• Amor Plantae (Alan Mui, QST; Christopher Sanchez, QST; L. George Sulak, QST) will create a treatment center designed to address mental health disorders and emotional traumas through applied therapies utilizing plant-based psychedelics, adaptogenic mycelium and non-THC minor cannabinoids.

• BIPOC Mental Health Collective (Moriah Mikhail; CAS; Nia Smith, CAS; Mariam Bashiru, Sargent; Olga Aguirre, CAS; Eshita Rahman, CAS) aims to expand their past Professor’s Panel on Mental Health & Academia to host regular (monthly or bi-monthly)”Wellness Office Hours” for students and faculty to discuss and workshop solutions surrounding mental health burdens in the academic world.

• BU Career Closet (Tima Dasouki, CAS) creates a space to provide free professional clothing for all BU students.

• deeper (Daniel Li, ENG; Nicole Kwon, ENG; Harry Li, ENG; Byron Mitchell, ENG) improves the quality of connection between mental health consumers and their loved ones allowing both parties to better empathize, understand, and connect with each other.

• Grad Students Who Hike (Kiran Khosla, SPH; Maribel Chahine, SPH; Alaina Tabani, SPH) this wellness grant is for students at the BUSM campus to meet, network and connect in a non-academic setting. This is being run as a pilot project to assess whether wellness programs such as this are in demand for graduate students at BU.

• HappyPack (Lauryn Bryant, SSW) is a space for online students to find belonging, connection, and wellbeing. Participants compete in challenges all while learning strategies to support mental, physical, and social wellbeing.

• The Healing Creative (Caylin Yorba-Ruiz, SSW; Jenna Disandro, SSW; Clara Gelderloos, SSW) aims to meet the needs of online and off-campus students who are not able to access clinical care through Boston University’s Sexual Assault Response & Prevention program. This project will create free accessible resources such as zines and coloring sheets to be housed on the SARP site.

• Taboo (Nesa Huda, COM) an event that features a short film about Muslim mental health, a de-stress station, and a panel talk with BIPOC mental health professionals from the Greater Boston Area.

• TGNC Advocacy Committee (Christa Nuzzo, CAS; Vlad Rada, CAS; Lena Broach, CFA; Kris Berg, CAS) plans to meet the need of a LGBTQ+ student-facing resource center at BU by providing life-changing and live-saving products to transgender and nonbinary BU students with a service that allows them to discreetly request and receive gender-affirming products.

• Wonderland: A Global Village (Sutikshna Veeravalli, Wheelock; Manasvee Muralikumaar, COM) is a space for students to explore their multiple intelligences through art-based activities.

Meet Our Community Impact Challenge Partners

The Wellbeing: Reimagined, Renewed, Revitalized Challenge was a collaboration between Innovate@BU, The Wellbeing Project, and BU Undergraduate Student Government.

Innovate@BU & BUild Lab provides programs and resources to help BU Terriers become drivers of innovation in their lives, communities, and careers.	The Wellbeing Project is a new campus-wide initiative to support students’ health and wellness during their time at BU.	BU Undergraduate Student Government works to better the college experience for BU’s 16,000 undergraduate students.

More Innovation, More Inspiration