T.S. Eliot wrote that April is the cruelest month. Well, administrators and health officials at the University of Massachusetts would at least like April’s drizzly showers to serve as a wake-up call to get out and get fit, as the campus marks National Public Health Week with a series of events intended to get students thinking about making healthy choices.

National Public Health Week began Monday and will run through Sunday. Here at UMass, events marking the week begin today, with the School of Public Health and Health Sciences (SPHHS) hosting its annual Research Day from 3 to 5 p.m. in the Amherst Room of the Campus Center. At that event, students from SPHHS will display health-related posters to be judged for content and presentation. Also on Tuesday will be the twenty-third annual Virginia A. Beal Lecture and Dinner in the Cape Cod Room of the Student Union. The gathering runs from 4:30 to 9 p.m., with this year’s theme titled “Reducing Hypertension: Are Americans Ready to Shake the Salt Habit?” Registration and a fee are required to attend the Beal dinner.

On Tuesday night, UM will also tackle sexual and reproductive health issues, with a screening of “PROTECTION: A film about men and condoms in the time of HIV and AIDS” at 7 p.m. in Hasbrouck Hall, room 134. The film, shot in South Africa, Kenya and Sierra Leone, seeks to serve as an impetus for young men to speak about the significance of protecting themselves, and their partners. The film’s producer, Jill Lewis, a professor of Literature and Gender Studies at Hampshire College, will host a question-and-answer session following the screening.

On Wednesday, a certified sex therapist and the former clinical director of the Human Sexuality Institute of Washington, D.C. will visit campus to discuss striking a healthy sexual balance. At 7:30 p.m. in 106 Isenberg, Joyce Joseph will deliver a lecture with a follow-up discussion titled “Sex: Getting It Right.”

More events will follow over the weekend and throughout the month.

– Collegian News Staff