Every semester the health classes show off the knowledge they have collected in a full exhibit in the gym with posters and projects, all focusing on different mental health issues and environmental problems. The health fair started last year and has continued every semester. The health teachers came together last year and decided it would be beneficial if the entire school were given the chance to learn about their mental health in a free and student-taught way, even if they have not yet taken the health class. Students taking the course are required to research and create a poster sharing all the information they have gathered about their topic.

   Students were mostly assigned topics, but some chose to highlight what they felt was essential to share. Junior Sarai Flores and her partners, Trevor Kanter (11), Talya Horn (11)  and Donya Hosseini (10) decided to make a presentation on emotional abuse.

   “[Emotional abuse] is not talked about yet and it’s a big problem” Flores said. Her group gave phone numbers people can call if they ever need assistance in an emergency and facts about emotional abuse. Like most groups, there was a participatory element to the project. Students who visited the health fair spent time at each station playing matching games, true/false games and spinning wheels to get prizes.

   “The health fair is fun and I’m getting a lot of free food and prizes from learning!” Flores said.

   A new addition to this year’s health fair was a room dedicated to safe sex and HIV/AIDS. The county recently changed rules making it so freshmen cannot take health due to the topic of contraceptives and sex. To still teach the student body that is allowed to be educated on the subject, the dance studio connected to the gym was blocked off to freshmen and all other students were able to go in and learn about sexual harassment, contraceptives and sexually transmitted diseases.

   Junior Meg Nelson feels the health fair is a great experience for classes to visit.

   “It educates students on different issues that they might be dealing with themselves,” Nelson said.

    Freshmen felt frustrated with the exclusion from the exhibit and preferred it more when those topics were unavailable to all students. In the past they could participate in the whole health fair without worrying about being on a list of people that could or could not enter. Walking through the aisles of projects, many freshmen were commenting on their curiosity of the room and their frustration of not being able to view it like their upperclassmen peers.

   The health fair has remained a positive and educational experience for the WJ student body and will continue with the 2018 fall semester health fair next school year.