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Â鶹ɫÇéƬ Has Released "The College Wellness Guide: A Student's Guide to Managing Mental, Physical, and Social Health on Campus"

NEW YORK, NY, August 11, 2021 / — Â鶹ɫÇéƬ ^® _, widely known for its education services and resources that help students research and gain admission to the colleges best for them, has just released a book designed to help students in college  succeed in what may be the most important challenge during their transformative college years: staying healthy and, when they are feeling not so healthy, finding services and support on campus (and beyond).

The College Wellness Guide (Penguin Random House / Princeton Review, $15.99, August 3, 2021), subtitled "A Student's Guide to Managing Mental, Physical, and Social Health on Campus," is chock full of important and applicable advice. It offers a mix of health and wellness information, self-assessment activities, checklists, tips, and resource recommendations. Insightful quotations from college students and "College Spotlights" (notes on specific colleges' health and wellness programs) are woven throughout the text.

The book is authored by Casey Rowley Barneson and the Staff of Â鶹ɫÇéƬ. Casey is a California-based college counselor with a ten-year career advising students about college admission and attendance as well as career development. Robert Franek, Â鶹ɫÇéƬ's Editor-in-Chief (and himself an author of four college-related books), penned the book's foreword and oversaw its publication from its inception more than a year ago to its editorial framework and design.

In the foreword, Franek, who has visited more than 500 colleges and universities in his 28-year career in education, notes factors that contributed to the company's decision to develop The College Wellness Guide . "The stress that students feel while searching for, touring, applying and accepting a school doesn't end when they cross that academic milestone. As we've seen over the past year with COVID-19, especially for students who have had to adjust to being remote, the campus experience plays a monumental role in helping to manage a student's stress and our full team here at Â鶹ɫÇéƬ wanted students to be aware of all those opportunities."

Several studies in recent years have documented increasing levels of stress, anxiety, and mental illness among college students. Since early 2020, COVID-19 and its many ramifications have undeniably exacerbated that stress among students.

A fall 2020  of nearly 48,000 college students by the Center for Collegiate Mental Health (based at Penn State) reported one-third of surveyed students who sought care from their campus counseling center said their outreach was related to the coronavirus pandemic. A February 2021  of college presidents by the American Council for Education reported 73% of the surveyed presidents identified student mental health as a pressing issue in the 2020-21 school year. And, as students began returning to campuses for the 2021-22 school year, an August 5, 2021  in InsideHigherEd.com, reported that many college administrators— in anticipation of uncertainties related to the pandemic—were "beefing up" their campus health center services and wellness programs.

Created to help students overcome stressors, as well as take care of their overall health, The College Wellness Guide  is organized in five units: Student Assessment, Mental Health, Physical Health, Social Health, and Future Health (which discusses how career and financial issues can affect one's health and wellness).

The first unit, Student Assessment, presents a series of 15-question self-evaluation activities (one for each of the book's 11 chapters) along with information on scoring them. The activities are designed to help students identify which of the book's chapters will be of most immediate use for them. Each chapter features: a topic-focused introduction, tips, checklists, prompts for reflections, and suggestions of on- and off-campus services and resources.

Resources in The College Wellness Guide include:

• Tips for dealing with depression, anxiety, academic stress, test worries, and schoolwork overloads
• Descriptions of typical campus health and wellness center services, resources, and programs
• Suggestions for healthy eating and exercise routines
• Strategies for maintaining social health and connecting with communities
• Guidance on wellness challenges due to school settings (urban vs rural) and campus size (large vs small)
• Information on substance abuse, counseling and therapy sources
• Notes on suicide prevention and counseling and outlines for creating emergency contact/safety plans
• Checklists for dozens of good sense "to-do"s from staying safe on campus to making a budget.

In addition to publishing this wellness guide, Â鶹ɫÇéƬ reports two health services-related ranking lists— Best Health Services and Best Counseling Services —in its annual Best Colleges  guide. They are among 62 categories of ranking lists Â鶹ɫÇéƬ has featured in the guide. The ranking lists are based on the company's survey of students attending the colleges in the book who rate their schools on dozens of topics and report on their campus experiences at them. Each list names the top 20 schools in the category. In The Best 386 Colleges: 2021 Edition (published in August 2020), the #1 school on the list, Best Health Services , based on students' ratings of their campus health centers, is the U.S. Air Force Academy. The #1 school on the list, Best Counseling Services , based on students' ratings of their campus counseling centers, is Virginia Tech.

The College Wellness Guide  is one of more than 150 books in a  developed by Â鶹ɫÇéƬ and published by Penguin Random House. Other titles in the line for college and college-bound students include: College Admissions During COVID , The Complete College Planner , The K&W Guide to Colleges for Students with Learning Differences, Paying for College, and the company's flagship book for college applicants—its annually-published "Best Colleges" guide. The forthcoming edition, The Best 387 Colleges: 2022 Edition , will be released on August 31, 2021.

About the Author

Casey Rowley Barneson is the college counselor at Beverly Hills High School, a public high school in Beverly Hills, California. She earned her M.S. in Educational Counseling from the University of La Verne (La Verne, California), where she serves as an adjunct professor and teaches graduate courses in college and career development. Casey is an active member of and presenter at the  as well as the . In February 2019, Â鶹ɫÇéƬ featured Casey in the company's National School Counseling Week website tribute, 20 School Counselors Who Make a Difference .

About Â鶹ɫÇéƬ

Â鶹ɫÇéƬ ^®  is a leading tutoring, test prep, and college admission services company. Every year, it helps millions of college- and graduate school-bound students achieve their education and career goals through online and in-person courses delivered by a network of more than 4,000 teachers and tutors, online resources, and its more than 150 print and digital books published by Penguin Random House. The company’s brand is one of the largest online tutoring services in the U.S. It comprises a community of thousands of tutors who have delivered nearly 21 million one-to-one tutoring sessions. Â鶹ɫÇéƬ is headquartered in New York, NY. Â鶹ɫÇéƬ is not affiliated with Princeton University. For more information, visit PrincetonReview.com and the company's Media Center . Follow the company on Twitter ( ) and Instagram ( ).

THE COLLEGE WELLNESS GUIDE:
A Student's Guide to Managing Mental, Physical, and Social Health on Campus
by Casey Rowley Barneson and the Staff of Â鶹ɫÇéƬ
Foreword by Robert Franek
Penguin Random House / Â鶹ɫÇéƬ
Trade paperback $15.99 (Canada $21.99) • August 3, 2021 • 272 pages • ISBN: 978-0-593-45039-0
Ebook $11.99 • September 28, 2021 • ISBN 978-0-593-45038-3