The Zen of Education: Meditation at Notre Dame de Namur University

College students are under a lot of pressure to finish school in a tight four years, maintain enough extracurriculars to build a Johnny Bravo-buff resume, and live the kind of social life only seen in movies.

Samantha Rupel, NDNU student

Samantha Rupel, NDNU student

My first semester at Notre Dame de Namur University (NDNU), I took the course Mindful Meditation with Amy Jobin. I hoped it would help ease me into my heavy workload. I had some vague familiarity with the practice of meditation, but I had never committed to sitting down Yoda-style with any consistency to see if it could help me reduce stress. In articles and on various websites, I kept reading how meditation practices produced the same striking list of results:

  • Improvements in concentration and attention
  • Improvement in focus under pressure
  • Improvements in academic achievement
  • Increase in self-awareness and overall emotional well-being
  • Improvements in sleep quality

NDNU has been adding mindful meditation events and resources to encourage students to take care of themselves, actively reducing their stress and anxiety using meditation. The university now offers the Mindful Meditation course, Freshman Seminar professors have been incorporating mindful breathing into the curriculum, and the campus’s Virtual Reality (VR) Lab is providing guided meditation.

Mindful Meditation is a one-unit course with Amy Jobin, who teaches students the history of meditation and traditional practices, as well as the application of mindful living. Students learn both seated and walking meditation, and can choose which they prefer to practice throughout the semester. This intimate course is not more than 10 students, making for interesting, open-floor conversations during class meetings. The class provides a good working knowledge of meditation, and helps students form a simple routine to maintain the habit.

Patti Andrews wears many hats at NDNU. She is the Student Success Center program director, Freshman Seminar director, and a history and political science professor. She incorporated more mindful meditation and mindful breathing exercises into the Freshman Seminar after discovering that an assignment to “hang out with a tree” became an unprompted habit for stressed-out students. This encouraged her to start incorporating mindful breathing into the beginning of her evening history courses: “When I see that students need to focus their energy, I might do a two-to-three minute guided meditation. Students really like it and get excited when they know it’s coming.” She watches her students giddily straighten up, folding their hands in their laps to get ready to relax and focus their energy before they dive into class.

The VR Lab offers a mindful meditation program where you can step into a fluorescent-lit room; pull on the squishy, padded visor with audio ear covers; and all of your surroundings disappear. You are dropped into one of five peaceful places of your choosing, like a Toy Story alien being chosen by The Claw to go on to a better place. The program is simple, it takes you to a quiet place and begins to guide your breathing using visual cues. The program is long enough to bring you to a calm state of mind without being so long that you are more stressed about losing valuable work time.

For me, meditation is a short and sweet way to maintain sanity through college and beyond. Notre Dame de Namur University has realized the effectiveness of meditation programs and is increasing access to these offerings for students, using yoga, seed-saving workshops, and guided meditation with live acoustic guitar. Students receive notification of these events through the Student Weekly Update from the Marketing and Communications Department.

As for the list of positive effects of meditation, I do find myself more focused and relaxed under pressure academically and personally. However, my sleep quality is not as high as promised. I thank the mindful meditation course and I blame my nocturnal, energetic cats.

Samantha Rupel is a senior in the Communication Department at Notre Dame de Namur University in Belmont, California. She is currently an Intern with the Marketing and Communications Department and enjoys writing sassy blogs for her patient and understanding university.

For more information on applying to Notre Dame de Namur University (NDNU), please visit the admissions page.

One Comment on “The Zen of Education: Meditation at Notre Dame de Namur University

  1. This type of awareness post is very important for every student to keep health and enjoy student life. Thanks for this post!

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