Taylor Jacoban, an Eastern Oregon University student, is greeted by eager dogs at EOU's Stress-Less event on March 6, 2024.

LA GRANDE — Hundreds of Eastern Oregon University students took a breather on Wednesday, March 6, 10 days before the start of winter term finals week.

The students were among those attending the revival of Eastern’s Stress-Less event, conducted at the university’s fieldhouse. Students and the public took part in a wide variety of activities to reduce their stress levels, including hugging animals, playing pickleball and table tennis and tossing ceramic plates against a portable wall.

The latter, put on by Eastern’s student government, was among the most popular activities, with students smashing about 250 dishes. Before making their tosses many students wrote on the plates things that frustrate them, including subjects they don’t like, said Isaac Insko, the chair of EOU’s student senate.

Plate smashing was popular, but it was no match for the event’s animal station, which resembled a petting zoo wing. At the station people could greet four-legged creatures, including Hampshire cross pigs, a goat, dogs and miniature horses.

Larry Rominie, of La Grande, had three dogs at the station, including an Italian greyhound, a Ibizan hound and a sheepherding canine. He said his dogs enjoyed the event immensely.

“They must have been petted by 1,000 people, and they loved it,” he said.

Romine’s dogs were in a fenced enclosure, but he said wouldn’t have had to worry about them running off.

“They just want to be petted,” he said. “They know they will not be if they leave.”

Romine said by the end of the day his dogs had lost interest in the cheese balls he was feeding them, which indicated to him that they were weary, but they remained excited to see people.

The pigs students got to hold included Hampshire cross piglets, which will be shown at 4-H events in the future, according to Jenny Bartell, of Bartell Farms, who brought some of the pigs to the Stress-Less event.

“I very much enjoy showing them off,” she said. “I wish more people could be around livestock.”

The event, the largest student-run event on campus, was led by EOU student Darby McDevitt for an internship project.

McDevitt said this was the first year EOU has conducted the Stress-Less event since 2020. None had been conducted since then primarily because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

More than 650 people attended the event, which was put on with the help of 120 volunteers, according to Kelly McNeil, an associate professor for the Community Health concentration in the Health and Human Performance Department at EOU. McNeil oversaw the Stress-Less event.

Previous Stress-Less events were conducted at Quinn Coliseum. McNeil said the fieldhouse is a much better place for the event because it has more space.

Animals were a popular part of past Stress-Less events, which was why they were bought in for this year’s event.

“We just had to have them again,” McNeil said.