This article is written by a student writer from the Her Campus at Harvard chapter.

First, the basics! Tell us a little about yourself — where are you from, what do you study, and what do you enjoy doing in your free time?

I’m a proud Californian from sunny Los Angeles and am studying Human Evolutionary Biology and Global Health and Health Policy here at Harvard! I absolutely love anything related to food, nutrition, and health, and in my free time, I love cooking/baking/eating, playing volleyball, rooting for my favorite soccer teams, and watching all of the television shows.

What are some of the extracurricular activities you are involved with on campus?

I’m Co-Director of the Happiness Project (a student organization dedicated to promoting happiness and decreasing stress on campus), a writer/editor for the Harvard Crimson, and a member of our Undergraduate Council student government. I’m also an active intramural volleyball player and involved in the Harvard Culinary Society, the Harvard University Dining Services Student Advisory Committee, and the Institute of Politics. While extracurriculars take up a huge amount of my time here, I absolutely love everything that I do and am grateful to be able to do them!

What are your plans for this summer?

This summer, I’ll be working at Massachusetts General Hospital in their Nutritional Metabolism program. I’m really excited to experience Boston in the summer time!

What would be your dream job after graduation?

I’d love to work in medicine and health! While I hope to become a medical practitioner in the long run, I’ve also developed a strong interest in public health and health policy and am exploring what opportunities there are in those fields.

So, tell us about the Happiness Semester Challenge! How did you get involved and what inspired you to spearhead it this year? What has the response been like?

The Happiness Semester Challenge is definitely my favorite project run by the Happiness Project. I was a participant in the Happiness Semester Challenge last spring, when it was in its inaugural year. While there were over 200 participants that year, I was among the few who completed all ten weeks. The idea of having weekly “challenges” that focus on promoting a specific area of healthy living in a stress-free way, where participants work together to fulfill each week’s goals, was incredibly appealing, and because it made such a positive impact on my semester, I knew I wanted to spearhead it in the future. I wanted to create an entirely new and unique community of healthy and happy leaders at a place like Harvard.

This year, the response to the Happiness Semester Challenge has been incredible! We’ve seen over 750 participants from all freshman dorms, twelve residential houses, and four class years join in on the challenge, and I’ve even had some alumni, grad students, and students from other colleges ask to join in. We definitely weren’t expecting such a significant amount of interest in our project, but it’s been incredibly fulfilling to be able to help reach out to so many students in the community!

That’s amazing! What have this year’s weekly challenges been like, and have any particular features been added to the 2013 challenge?

Throughout the semester, we’ve held challenges every week with different themes, ranging from topics like going off campus, doing good deeds, eating healthier, or getting a full night’s rest. We’ve also had a few weeks with bigger challenges like our “GOOD MOOD Week” (where participants were asked to limit their complaining and instead focus on laughter and happiness by listening to happy songs, watching comedy shows/movies, or attending comedy and laughter meditation events we held) or our “Relax & Treat Yo’ Self Week” during Spring Break (where we asked participants to do something that makes them happy that they don’t normally make time for).

This year, we’ve focused more on the community-driven aspect of the Challenge. We want to foster a sense of community and group cohesion in forming healthy habits. In the middle of the semester, we held a school-wide Happy Study Break that saw over 200 students stop by to relax and have fun with food, music, games, photos, and arts & crafts. We also wanted to emphasize the collaborative nature of the challenges during the semester; we even asked participants to submit their ideas for the Spring Break Challenge week, where we compiled submitted ideas by them and then let them choose which one they wanted to try for the week.

Why do you think initiatives like the Happiness Semester Challenge are so important here at Harvard?

I think that the incredible amount of interest in the Happiness Semester Challenge this semester shows that people are really interested in promoting happiness and minimizing stress at Harvard. We provide the challenges, prizes, and opportunities to meet like-minded happiness-driven peers for the students, but what they get out of the program is entirely up to them. Harvard can certainly be a stressful place, where it’s easy to get caught up in what seems to be a never-ending cycle of work and commitments, but we want to show students that it’s possible to be both successful and happy. It’s important to keep a positive mindset, and we hope to build a community of people who are intent on promoting happy, healthy lifestyles on campus and raising awareness to encourage others to do the same.

What are the most meaningful things you’ve taken away from your own Happiness Semester Challenge, and from the process of organizing it for the Harvard community?

Organizing the Challenge for the Harvard community—and working with local businesses, student organizations and clubs, and Harvard campus resources in order to do so—has definitely been a really big task, but while I definitely didn’t expect the Challenge to become such a large endeavor, it’s been so wonderful seeing it take shape. The best part of this has definitely been hearing the positive feedback from everyone. The enthusiasm behind it all has been great, and it makes my job even more fulfilling. I’ve loved interacting with so many students in the Harvard community and hearing feedback from them on how the Challenge has impacted their lives. Whether it’s a small change like adding more fruits and vegetables to their diet to promote healthy eating or a bigger change like engaging others more frequently in random acts of kindness, I’m always excited to hear what participants have taken away from the Challenge. It’s been such a phenomenal experience for me, and I’m really glad to be able to share it with so many other Harvard students. I’ve enjoyed being a part of the outstanding spirit of cooperation and community manifested throughout the semester and can’t wait to do it all again next year!

Cindy Shih ’15

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