The counseling department has started FIT sessions on Fridays, where students can come to take their mind off their platter of schoolwork and enjoy fun activities the counselors have planned for them.

“[The FIT sessions] are to provide students the opportunity to come and do group sessions together so that we could have opportunities to help students figure out what they need and support them,” freshmen counselor Clare Smith said. “They generally start with a mindfulness exercise because that’s something we could all use in any class; it’s a tool we give all kids. Sessions are really to help kids know each other and get more comfortable about being at Bowie.”

Some fun activities they plan include making slime, creating a human knot, and bringing in puppies to play with.

“We did a mindfulness activity to calm down and get in the zone but in mine we didn’t have a super specific activity; we made slime,” freshmen counselor Laura Loza said. “We did it to do something different and not do academic work for a little bit which was fun and relaxing. It was something that they didn’t have to think about.”

Overall, the goal is that the kids that come to the FIT sessions leave with a relaxed mind and new friends.

“I feel like the kids that have come have made friends with each other too so they’ve gotten to know one another and they continue to come back; they enjoy seeing those people because their people they wouldn’t necessarily hang out with,” Loza said.