Welcome to your full report. Here we provide an overview of the project, how the team's research was conducted, our analysis of the research, your recommendations, and a review of literature. 

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     The IUPUI Office of Health and Wellness Promotion is an office under the IUPUI Division of Student Affairs. They focus on the eight dimensions of wellness (physical, emotional, social, intellectual, financial, occupational, spiritual, and environmental) as a way to promote the wellbeing of IUPUI students. They offer wellness coaching for a variety of different categories. A few of these include fitness coaching, time management coaching, sexual health coaching, relationship coaching, diet coaching, and financial coaching. While they have strong engagement from female first- and second- year students, the office desires to expand its engagement with different demographics of students. The three target markets are male students of any year, graduate students, and members of the BIPOC community.

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     Our goal after making a partnership with the IUPUI Office of Health and Wellness Promotion was to use research, community outreach, and personal analysis to create viable recommendations that could increase not only student engagement from the specific desired demographics but engagement from the student body in general. After analyzing the research, we were also able to attain data from a local study that we performed. From this information, our group was able to construct recommendations that we feel will increase student engagement with the wellness coaching program that the IUPUI Office of Health and Wellness Promotion offers. 

 

 

Methodology: Literary Research and Local Online Survey

     To direct the focus of our research, we met with Ryan Anderson, the Health Promotion Specialist for the IUPUI Office of Health and Wellness Promotion, on Monday, October 5, 2020. The IUPUI library databases were primarily used to view academic sources and articles to complete necessary and beneficial research pertaining to health and wellness coaching. Research was done to not only look for successful practices among health and wellness organizations that target students but also organizations that target all ages to see if there were any practices that could be utilized by the IUPUI coaching staff. Our research was also focused around the following sub topics:

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• Social media marketing to college students

• Successful health and wellness coaching categories

• Effects of national crisis on student’s mental health

• Scalability of wellness coaching programs

 

     Research was also conducted using Google to find comparable health and wellness promotion offices at other universities to develop ideas for IUPUI’s to be successful and to find more information about peer-to-peer marketing strategies. 

     In order to construct recommendations for increasing engagement among students with the health and wellness coaching programs, data was needed from the student body. A survey was created with a specific pathway of questions to accumulate data to construct these recommendations. The survey was created using Google Forms and was tested multiple times for ease of access and completion. The survey link was dispersed among many IUPUI student databases including the Freshman, Sophomore, Junior, and Senior databases. Responses were strictly limited to IUPUI students. The requirement of an IUPUI email to access the survey made this possible. The survey that was created and dispersed generated over 60 responses from students ranging from freshmen to seniors. Click here to access the full survey.  

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Demographic Survey Questions:

     The first portion of the survey asked simple demographic questions relating to age, sex, sexual orientation, race, and academic year. These questions were asked in order to gain a better understanding of who utilized the health and wellness programs at IUPUI and also what demographic of people are the most open and willing to participate in these programs. The largest portion of students who are looking for health and wellness coaching are freshmen.

 

Health and Wellness Survey Questions:

    The second portion of the survey asked more specific questions relating to aspects of health and wellness of the students and also their familiarity and willingness to participate in health and wellness coaching. These questions were asked to figure out what categories of health and wellness coaching students would be most willing to participate in, what environments students would be mostly likely to participate in health and wellness coaching whether it be individual or in groups, and other questions determining how to reach these students with advertising and follow up contact. 

 

 

Analysis: Local Study Results and Conclusions with Research

     The analysis section offers crucial information that shaped the team's recommendation by highlighting information from our review of literature, local study, and polling research.

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Health and Wellness Coaching can improve students performance in school

     Integrating health and wellness programs into the lives of college students can not only improve his or her daily life, but can also positively impact job performance. Many studies have been created and tested, following the idea that health and wellness coaching can improve the job done by college students. A study by Todd Gibbs and James Larcus found evidence that  “Respondents also indicated wellness coaching had enhanced their capacity for setting and achieving goals (84%), and utilizing their personal strengths (83%)” (Gibbs, 2017).

 

     At Ohio State University, studies showed that 84% of the students involved in these studies have shown that each saw improvement in achieving their goals, and using personal strengths to improve their overall performance in school. Another study was done by Lise Solberg Nes, Daniel R. Evans, and Suzanne C. Segerstrom, which found academic optimism that resulted from health and wellness coaching showed improvement in motivation, GPA, and adjustment for new students. “Dispositional and academic optimism were associated with less chance of dropping out of college, as well as better motivation and adjustment, academic optimism was also associated with higher grade point average (GPA)” (Nes, Evans, Segerstrom, 2009). By advertising towards students using the current pandemic, and using this information on how it can benefit students' success, will persuade them to join and participate to help benefit themselves.

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Health and Wellness Specialization:

     As we know, the IUPUI Office of Health and Wellness Promotion offers a wide spread array of programs and different categories of health wellness coaching. The office has six different health and wellness coaches working for them full time. In order to get in contact with these coaches a student must schedule an appointment. These coaches offer services relating to the following health and wellness categories: 

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• Physical Wellness

• Social Wellness

• Occupational Wellness

• Emotional Wellness

• Intellectual Wellness

• Financial Wellness

• Environmental Wellness

• Spiritual Wellness

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     The Office of Health and Wellness offers these programs to be available for all students for every aspect of their lives whenever they are going through a tough time and need assistance. While this is commendable that they are trying to help everyone, it may not be the best way to optimize the student engagement in their programs. Research was performed on this particular topic on other universities and business organizations that specialize in health and wellness coaching. 

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University Health and Wellness Programs:

     While many schools were researched in depth about their health and wellness programs, two schools particularly stood out in the way that they run their coaching programs. These two schools were The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and The University of California, Berkeley. For reference, both of these universities claim “high levels” of student engagement with no publicized specific numbers or percentages of engagement. 

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     There was one stark difference in the way both of these schools run their wellness coaching programs. While these schools do offer coaching on a variety of topics, they tend to specialize and get most of their foot traffic for fitness, financial, and time management coaching. Because of this, the universities also focus on these particular areas of promotion. Their programs focus very little on other things such as sexual health and relationship coaching. Based on the survey that was performed by our group, 83% of students were interested in fitness coaching, about 58% were interested in diet and financial coaching, and 54% of students surveyed were interested in time management coaching. On the opposite side of this spectrum, only 35% of students reported they would be interested in relationship coaching and the lowest number of students at less than 25% reported they would be interested in sexual health coaching. Because of this information, it would be sensible to suggest that the Office of Health and Wellness, specialize and allocate more of its resources to the more desired programs such as fitness, diet, financial, and time management, and spend less time and resources on sexual health and relationship coaching. 

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Professional Health and Wellness Programs:

     Unlike schools and universities, who have to have an abundance of coaching choices and opportunities for their students, professional organizations are able to even further specialize and only off a few different coaching options. A majority of these health and wellness coaching organizations specialize in either fitness coaching, time management coaching, and financial coaching. These organizations try to avoid emotional, intellectual, and spiritual coaching and instead leave these to other qualified professionals such as therapists. Either way, these organizations boast great success in the specialization of their coaching options. This provides more evidence to support the specialization and allocation of resources to the more popular programs dealing with fitness, dieting, time management, and finance as opposed to relationship and sexual health coaching. 

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Focus on Students: Peer Coaching Benefits Students and Student-Coaches 

     Because of your status as an office within the IUPUI Division of Student Affairs, your focus on students will always be the key to your success. In order to expand your wellness coaching program, you might want to incorporate undergraduate peer coaches into your staff. Margaret Swarbrick, Kenneth Gill, and Carlos Pratt of the Rutgers University School of Health Professions, Psychiatric Rehabilitation, and Counseling Professions wrote on the benefits of peer coaching to both the student-participant and the student-coach; their study reported significant progress towards attaining life goals at two to four weeks (p. 1). Moreover, long-term improvements in perceived health were sustained after eight to ten weeks (p.1). This is ultimately beneficial for both the participant and your potential student staff. 

 

Using Peer Coaching to Be on the Cutting Edge and Expand the Program

     Furthermore, peer coaching is an avenue that the Office of Health and Wellness Promotion can truly benefit from exploring. The use of peer health educators by similar college health and wellness promotion offices has been a growing trend; however, this is not the same for peer wellness coaching (The American College Health Association, 2020). The American College Health Association instead described a stagnant trend for utilizing students for wellness coaching; but, it was cited that this could have possibly been due to the required deeper exploration of the intersectional domains of student life. 

 

     Students who have a passion for and expertise in holistic wellness and student development can help provide a “cost-effective and scalable model” for wellness coaching programs. This is really important to keep in mind as you want to increase student engagement in the wellness coaching program, since you will need more coaches to keep up with the demand. 

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Create an Experience Worthy of Telling Your Peers

     Peers are really important, regardless of whether they are on your coaching staff or not. If you are able to create an environment where students feel comfortable and enjoy the program, it is more likely that they will recommend this program to a friend. This sentiment was evident in current research; a marketing solution agency found that college students were highly influenced by their peers to the point that 92% of students changed purchasing habits based on peer influence. 

 

     At a university where there are so many opportunities for students to do things combined with the internet’s seemingly endless information overload, it is beneficial to have word-of-mouth advertising by students, which will be more likely to happen if they have a good experience with wellness coaching. Advertisements can also include quotes and videos from real students in order to be more successful in attracting people. 

 

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Expanding the Program with a Focus on Key Demographics 

     Business experts recognize that business expansion tends to focus on several key cornerstones like defining a consumer and building collaborations. According to one article in Forbes, for businesses to be successful in their expansion they should focus on a key customer demographic, or the potential customer that they want to attract. You provided us that your program was mostly used by white, freshman, and female students. Although you are looking to reach out to other demographics, it is important that as you start to grow, from a business perspective, that you focus on the demographics that you are currently reaching well. This will help you build and once the program is larger, it can reach out to other demographics.  

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     Our survey that we conducted through the IUPUI Class Facebook pages had an overwhelming majority from the demographics that you are currently reaching: white (79%), freshman (47%), and female (87%). You can and should expand using these demographics (and their intersections) by connecting with them on the IUPUI Facebook pages. There are a total of 13,250 IUPUI Facebook members between the IUPUI Jaguar Families group, the IUPUI Class of 2021 group, the IUPUI Class of 2022 group, the IUPUI Class of 2023 group, and the IUPUI Class of 2024 group. This is a large group that you can be reaching. 

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Expanding with the Collaboration of Others 

     Like stated before, social media is a great way to reach out to others. Whether it be the IUPUI Facebook group or Instagram pages, it can help you grow. As you do reach out to other groups on campus, partner with diversity student organizations to promote wellness coaching on their social media platforms and in their newsletters. This allows you to reach out to your wider audience that you are wanting to reach out to.  

Try to build collaborations with other organizations to create a network of partners, which can be helpful for advertisements. You can create a culture with freshmen by being active on their Facebook pages and interacting with other groups on campus. For example, you can reach 28,750 IUPUI Instagram followers by collaborating with the following four pages:

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• IUPUI (@iupui) 

  • 24,500 followers

• IUPUI Campus Center (@iupuicampuscntr)

  • 2,200 followers

• IUPUI Multicultural Center @mciupui

  • 700 followers

• IUPUI Division of Student Affairs @iupuistudentaffairs

  • 1,350 followers

 

Social media advertising to specific groups may increase awareness

     Today, many forms of social media are used such as:

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• Facebook, (28.3%)

• Instagram, (62.3%)

• Snapchat, 

• Linkedin, 

• Twitter, 

• TikTok, etc. 

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     Advertisement in social media is one of the easiest ways to reach out to current college students, but there can be downfalls. Meena Zenith, author of an academic journal called Forecasting the impact of social media advertising among college students using higher order statistical functions, discusses the benefits of social media advertising. She states "The most recent successful targeted information on advertising systems is provided to the producers and consumers, which facilitates the producers to target users based on profile information, online activities, and user demographics" (p. 291). From this information the researchers found advertising works best when you target certain groups. For example our research for IUPUI would be helpful in addressing specific posts to those who are graduate students. While in the survey a low number of students were graduates, the market is still available and perhaps reaching out to that one student would provide clarity. 

     By focusing on one specific group of students, IUPUI Health and Wellness could better increase their incoming sessions in groups they have few of. IUPUI is a very diverse campus, with many different backgrounds of people. In our survey most of the participants said they identified closest with a “white” background. In response, another survey could be sent to specifically find the perspectives of those who are of other ethnicities and races to help provide a more diverse pool of responses. 

     Upon this research, our team found a different response to what is the best social media source to reach college students. Emily Emerick, Paul Caldarella, and Sharon Black, authors of the academic journal through Brigham Young University, College Student Journal, states "The first research question asked students which social media accounts they maintained. Results showed that Facebook was the most popular account, followed by Instagram, Snapchat, and Twitter." When our groups formed a similar question, the results proved that Instagram, rather than Facebook, has risen to a higher status. This could be because a few years have passed between the two surveys and instagram is more popular with the students now. 

     The numbers of social media are going to constantly change through the years. Many of these social media have not been around for that long and soon enough there will be another media platform. By staying tuned into the most popular forms of communication IUPUI can best target their students. Through the research of Oxford, they also found that there are benefits to reaching students through social media, but it can also deem itself as a distraction or lack clear explanation. IUPUI would be best to reach students through Instagram, as it was the highest response marker, but to be aware that nothing is better than face to face as it lowers confusion and direct understanding of what is being marketed. 

     Advertising and follow up are a bit different in their form of communication. While Facebook and Instagram are the top two advertising mediums, text messages and school emails are the top two forms of follow up. Advertising could be mixed with these two forms of communication by sending emails and texts to persuade those to join Health and Wellness. IUPUI could take initiative in reaching out to students through email and text messages as that is where they deemed they view information the most. 
 

Advertising to specific groups rather than one-on-one may lower stress

     The Health and Wellness program has currently worked in session between the leader and the student, but small groups happen to be a better force of action to some groups. According to the local study performed by our team, “ a total of 94.3% of applicants chose some form of group communication.” Out of the three forms, partnership, small group, and strangers, the highest amount of preference was from small groups. 

     Working in small groups, and having communication through each other rather than individually, increases the learning process for students, benefits mental health, and provides better understanding than large groups. Kerstin Hamann , Department of Political Science, University of Central Florida, Orlando, FL states " students find that small groups are better places to express thoughts, and to get to know other students" (p.52). Hamann through her experiment with college students found that working in smaller groups comforted students in their studies. This also allowed students to learn through other individuals and decrease the amount of feeling alone or lost. 

     On another hand, James Beauchemin, author of the academic journal on Health and Social Work from Oxford University, states "Implementation of an evidence-based, solution-focused wellness model provides an option for improving wellness and decreasing stress that can be used multiple times per semester... a greater number of students can potentially be supported"(Beauchemin, 2018, p. 95). He finds through his research that working in groups not only benefits the students in wellness, but also helps the college by not always having enough staff. For IUPUI this states that perhaps transitioning from one on one session to more group settings would increase the number of students who sign up, and support staff availability in the current moment. By decreasing the stress upon students, students may be more likely to show up if they know their friends can sit right next to them while they discuss. 

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In-Depth Recommendations for the IUPUI Office of Health and Wellness Promotion

     We wanted to provide you with all of our recommendations in a comprehensive list, separate from the rest of the report. Therefore, we included here what our team recommends for you, the IUPUI Office of Health and Wellness Promotion: ​

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• Advertise for wellness coaching by using marketing materials concerning feelings about COVID-19

  • Acknowledge in marketing materials that the novel coronavirus has impacted students in negative ways in which wellness coaching can help improve wellness for students

  • Empathize with students as they struggle to adjust with classes being moved online

  • Recognize in marketing materials that students are losing motivation and drive during the pandemic

  • State that wellness coaching can help motivate students and even prevent a high dropout rate 

 

• Specialize coaching options by shifting focus of the wellness coaching programs offered

  • Shift away from sexual health and relationship coaching since less than 35% of students surveyed reported they would be interested in participating

  • Focus more on fitness, diet, time management, and financial coaching since over 50% of students were interested in participating in these coaching programs with 83% being interested in fitness coaching

  • Allocate more marketing resources and time to the most desired health and wellness programs to increase student engagement

  • Continue to have a general option that would include less selected areas like sexual health and relationship coaching because although they were not as highly requested, they are still important

 

• Focus on your strengths with peers and current demographics to expand

  • Continue working with students and make them an integral part of your wellness coaching staff since it is also beneficial for the student coaches and participants

  • Focus on creating an experience that participants would want to tell their peers because college students are heavily influenced by their peers and do not want to miss out on something

  • Target your current key demographic, which happens to be white, female freshmen but collaborate with other diverse campus organizations to expand wellness coaching to other demographics

  • Utilize the IUPUI Classes Facebook pages because they your current key demographic interacts with posts about wellness coaching and can help you with expansion

 

• Plan strategic social media marketing campaigns for college students 

  • Stay tuned on the next platform and be aware of what is most popular, as what is “in” is constantly changing

  • Avoid the confusion that social media can cause, so be clear in your explanations of what you offer 

  • Utilize more Instagram campaigns over other social media as it was overwhelmingly preferred over other platforms by a higher number of students

  • Bold titles like “Graduate Student”, “Black", and "LGBTQ+ community” to market to those you are targeting  

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• Utilize small groups, or multiple forms of group communication in sessions 

  • Form small groups as it is the most popular form of group communication (these could be those with similar issues or session topics) 

  • Promote that groups can decrease stress and anxiety upon the students attending 

  • Divide time between different groups and staff to ensure efficiency and effectiveness

  • Still provide the option of one-on-one sessions as less than half still prefer it, but groups would form
    a potential avenue for expansion

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Literature Review

     The review of literature section dives deep into the research preformed by the team.

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Wellness Coaching can solve problems caused by Coronavirus for College students

     With coronavirus, there have been many negative impacts on college students, which has affected things including: grades, mental health, motivation, etc. The results of an interview survey for college students showed the results that, “Out of 195 participants, 138 (71%) indicated that their stress and anxiety had increased due to the COVID-19 pandemic, whereas 39 (20%) indicated it remained the same and 18 (9%) mentioned that the stress and anxiety had actually decreased” (Son, 2020). Further results from this study also revealed that, “A vast majority of participants (173/195, 89%) indicated difficulty in concentrating on academic work due to various sources of distraction. Nearly half of them (79/173, 46%) mentioned that their home is a distracting environment and a more suitable place to relax rather than to study” (Son, 2020). Students are looking for a new change in order to help them with their mental health, motivation, and more during this pandemic. One suggestion being Health and Wellness coaching, which has had many studies done over it, one of which comes from Mettler Clark, stating, “Recently, Mettler and colleagues found that participation in wellness coaching improved motivation, importance, and confidence for making positive health and behavior change” (Mettler, 2016). By advertising towards students that Wellness Coaching can potentially solve their problems inflicted by coronavirus, students will be more likely to join the program.

Social Media Advertisement Goals Through Finding Which Source Suits Your Audience the Most

     Experts explain the effects of social media as a use of advertising or connecting with students in this day and age, while finding that social media has it downfalls as well. Meena Zenith, the author of an academic journal discussing the benefits of social media advertising states ". The most recent successful targeted information on advertising systems is provided to the producers and consumers, which facilitates the producers to target users based on profile information, online activities, and user demographics" (p. 291). From this information the researchers found advertising works best when you target certain groups. For example our research for IUPUI would be helpful in addressing specific posts to those who are graduate students. 

This research further allowed researchers to find that it is best to know your audience in what is the best social media source to reach them. Emily Emerick, Paul Caldarella, and Sharon Black, authors of an academic journal through Brigham Young University states "The first research question asked students which social media accounts they maintained. Results showed that Facebook was the most popular account, followed by Instagram, Snapchat, and Twitter." Through their research they also found that there are benefits to reaching students through social media but it can also deem itself as a distraction or lack clear explanation. While both sets of authors agree that using social media to reach students has many benefits as it is used by most college students, there can be disadvantages like unclear understanding or distractions. 

Peer Coaching Allows for Wellness Coaching Program Expansion While Benefiting Student Coaches 

     The key to success for any college health promotion office is peers, regardless of whether the target program is a wellness coaching program or not. The American College Health Association (2020) has seen the growing trend of peer health educators being an integral part of the effective health promotion strategies that many college health and wellness promotion offices are using (p.5). They describe a stagnant trend for peers being used in wellness coaching due to the required deeper exploration of intersectional domains of student life; however, they believe that thoroughly trained “students who have a passion for and expertise in holistic wellness and student development” can help provide a “cost-effective and scalable model” for wellness coaching programs (p.5).” Margaret Swarbrick, Kenneth Gill, and Carlos Pratt, three professors at Rutgers University School of Health Professions, Psychiatric Rehabilitation, and Counseling Professions, further the benefits of peer coaching by explaining that peer coaches as well as wellness coaching participants report significant progress towards attaining life goals at two to four weeks and long-term sustained improvements in perceived health after eight to ten weeks (p.1). These together point to the conclusion that peer coaches would be beneficial for a wellness coaching program. 

Expanding a Business or Organization with Peer-to-Peer Marketing and Focus on Key Demographics 

     Experts recognize that expansion of businesses or organizations focus on several key cornerstones like a commitment to growth, defining a consumer or member, and building collaborations. Pulp Strategy, a marketing solution agency that has worked with Google, Microsoft, Michelin, and many other corporations, say that college students are highly influenced by their peers, that 92% of people changed purchasing behaviors based on influence by their peers, and that peer-to-peer marketing is the future of reaching people in the world of information overload. Philip Salter, a contributor with Forbes, states that for businesses to be successful in their expansion they should focus on a key customer demographic, the potential customer that they want to or are attracting, and build collaborations with other organizations to create a network of partners, which can be helpful for advertisements. Both of these sources together provide a plan for an organization or business to expand its customer base by focusing on the customers that they already have and making them want to recommend the business or organization to a peer. 

The Benefits of Small Groups in a Setting of College Students Pertaining to Reaching Students Best 

      Experts explain how working in small groups, and having communication through each other rather than individually, increases the learning process for students, benefits mental health, and provides better understanding than large groups. Kerstin Hamann, Department of Political Science, University of Central Florida, Orlando, FL states "students find that small groups are better places to express thoughts, and to get to know other students" (p.52). Hamann through her experiment with college students found that working in smaller groups comforted students in their studies. This also allowed this to learn through other individuals and decrease the amount of feeling alone or lost. 

      James Beauchemin, author of an academic journal on Health and Social Work from Oxford University, states "Implementation of an evidence-based, solution-focused wellness model provides an option for improving wellness and decreasing stress that can be used multiple times per semester... a greater number of students can potentially be supported." Beauchemin through his research finds that working in groups not only benefits the students in wellness, but also helps the college by not always having enough staff. Together the Beauchemin and Hamann agree that working in groups benefits students through mental health, better comprehension, and school systems. 

The Importance and Student Benefit of Health and Wellness Coaching On College Campuses

     Experts at Colorado State University Journal of Student affairs discuss the importance of wellness coaching for younger students and the usefulness of different aspects of coaching (Rentaria). In referencing the importance of wellness coaching, they quote the American College Health Association writing, “Health promotion on college campuses has been identified as a critical factor for nationwide health improvement.”(p. 26). According to a survey done by the American College Health Association in 2014, 84.6% of students reported feeling overwhelmed, stressed, exhausted, or lonely and seeking health and wellness assistance. Colorado State compiled the information from all of their health and wellness coaching meetings for the year of 2013-2014 with the following statistics standing out. 66% of the programs clients identified as female with about a third of the total clientele being freshmen or first year students. The most common wellness dimensions that were described as the focused areas for the programs students were emotional(87%), social(59%), and career(48%)(p.29). These dimensions most closely relate to time management and financial(career) and diet and fitness(social). At the conclusion of the journal, Colorado State determined that over 90% of their clients who received coaching for emotional, social, or career needs saw improvement and success in their coaching sessions. 
 

Conclusion

     The preceding report was prepared for the IUPUI Office of Health and Wellness Promotion to provide recommendations for increasing student participation in their wellness coaching program. Our writing team was able to find research these recommendations through various sources 

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