Student Minds Conference 2016: Students as Partners – Part 2 Our Solution

So in our last post on the Student Minds conference we discussed the University’s  problems with their current support framework for students with mental health issues. But its not very helpful for us to just point out negatives, which brings us to the second half of the conference. 

After some much needed refreshments we reconvened for the workshop portion of the event. We were asked to divide into groups mixed with students and workers and given large sheets of paper to come up with a step by step initiative for Students as partners. I presented the initiative ( I had a lot to say on the topic) to the rest of the conference and received a really positive reaction with multiple people approaching me later in the day. Below is a rough outline of what I said. 

Step 1 : Conduct a Q & A style forum where both students and staff have equal opportunity to voice their opinions and concerns to one another. 

Step 2 : Accessibility / Normalisation of Mental Health resilience/ mindfulness

• Continue with Curriculum re-newel to build student resilience and success 
• General education courses on mental resilience/ mindfulness should be made available for ALL university students not just the psychology department. 
• These courses could be offered (or compulsory) to students in their first year of university providing them with the best opportunity to maximise their studies and reduce stress levels.
• This could also be introduced in the form of a compulsory online tutorial ( similar to ELISE on Moodle) 
• Encourages the idea of self management 

Step 3 : Compulsory Mental health / First aid Training for lecturers, tutors, support staff.

This will help in a number of areas:

• Take some much needed pressure off overburdened support staff. 
• Reduce University drop out rates. 
• Build better relationships between students / teachers and academics. 
• Students shouldn’t have to be registered with disabilities in order for staff to take them seriously or show kindness / compassion. 
• May help ease problem of promoting help seeking support services that are too overwhelmed to assist. 

At the end of semester students could also fill in a CATEI type evaluation of their own mental health state. This way the university could gather regular much needed data , and even screen those struggling. 

These were just a few simple suggestions I came up with from the conference. There is still a huge amount of work to be done in this area. The conference was a great starting point for initiating  the conversation between students and staff and represents an opportunity to form meaningful connections and collaborate to create a safe and nurturing environment for both parties. 

X x

BB

Student Minds Conference 2016: Students as Partners

During the mid-semester break I attended a student run mental health conference at the University of New South Wales (UNSW) for Mind Your Head Australia . The theme of the day was ‘students as partners’, a fitting theme given that the conference itself was put together by the wonderful (student) initiative  Student Minds.

The conferences (as its theme suggests) looked at the importance of using  students as partners, specifically those who have been through or been touched by mental health services before, as they are able to provide invaluable insight and feedback for improvement of the universities current support systems.

This is an issue very dear to my heart as my own personal struggle with the University’s support system was a horrible experience and almost led to me dropping out of my studies permanently. Below is a mixture of points taken from the conference and personal observations about what needs to happen in the University.

The most glaringly obvious issue is lack of infrastructure, the university is under-resourced, under-funded and under-staffed. As a result an obvious burden is being placed on the few staff members that remain, this has a number of flow on effects. Firstly it means that staff often have to go ‘beyond the line of duty’ staying back and working long hours. Secondly it can mean that the quality of service being delivered to students suffers as staff are trying to accomodate for growing numbers of students seeking mental health assistance or disability registration. Thirdly and this one is probably the most important, students seeking help are getting turned away or wait listed ! This is simply unacceptable.

As we mentioned in a previous post Beyond blue state that 1 in 4 youths are experiencing mental health issues. With roughly  53, 400 students currently at UNSW that would mean an estimate of 13,370 current students may be affected and I can assure you that the University wouldn’t have the capabilities to deal with this if all of a sudden these students began actively seeking help (as we are ‘encouraged’ to do).

This places support staff in a difficult position, while they try to encourage student ‘help seeking behaviour’ they are cautious about doing so given the services current state of overwhelm. Deterring students who have built up the courage to help seek is simply not an option.  So what is the answer ?

The First speaker of the day, Ben Veness suggested one answer to this is partnerships with health services. This way the University could outsource their spill over and still be assured that students would be receive the treatment and support they need. I think this is a great solution in the short run, but it needs to be more than just handing a student a page full of websites and helplines (although that has its place). If a student has made the effort to try and see a advisor or councillor then they are often at a point of overwhelm and need assistance making the next steps. It should be a REQUIREMENT for Universities (especially expensive ones like UNSW) to provide students with this basic First aid.

Other major issues identified with the current system were :

1. The level of red tape and bureaucracy -> The difficulty this presents for student who are in need and at the end of their tether.
2. Problem of being palmed from one department to another i.e. the old ‘we cant help you but you should go to this department’ or the many people you need to see and documents you need to provide for extensions and extenuating circumstances.
3. The level of distrust and ignorance among lecturers and tutors about mental health. In an establishment full of staff that primarily deal with young adults ( a considerable amount of whom suffer mental health issues) it seems like a no brainer that staff should all be required to take basic mental health first aid. Teachers are all required to under go basic physical first aid qualifications, so why is mental first aid being so ignored? If the University was serious about fostering a better mental health environment they would make is compulsory for all teaching staff to undergo basic training. In the end it is the staff who are dealing with students on a day to day basis and it can have serious effects when they do not know how to handle sensitive situations or even recognise signs of a problem. Often this can result in students leaving University and drop out rates rising.

Photo: The Student Minds Conference at UNSW

Photo: Some of the amazing Student Minds Team