Queen Mary University of London, Centre for the History of the Emotions:
The Flourishing University, Wellbeing in Higher Education
Seminar, podcast and interviews:
https://blogs.history.qmul.ac.uk/flourishing/category/student-mental-health/
Notes:
Panel Discussion: Should Universities Teach Wellbeing?
21st May 2019
- Universities need to make sure they don’t take over responsibilities from other services – NHS
- Embed in discipline and tie into learning and make relevant
- Needs to be at the centre not at the periphery
- Distress and difficulty is routine not exceptional and we need to teach it as such.
Interview: Gareth Hughes of Derby University on bridging student learning and wellbeing
3rd August 2017
- You have to make teaching learning discipline-specific.
- Not voluntary, must be embedded in a module.
- Observe students to design curriculum.
- Focus on first year, needs to be throughout the year not just at the beginning
- Transition anxiety – entry into the new environment makes students ‘hyper-aroused’, focus has before been on exit stress
- Students need to work out how to meet their needs quickly, needs like ‘belonging’ and ‘socialisation’
- Widening participation students experience the university space as even more ‘alien’
- Do we know enough about ‘socialisation’? And yet it has such an impact
- You need a philosophy, strategy and key principles
- Waves of activity addressing different audiences:
wave 1 – workshops for all students.
wave 2 – work vulnerable students
wave 3 – work with students at risk
This could be more inclusive?! Not feeding into the deficit model in the way that extra support tutorials do?!
Help students manage their needs themselves. Your work is developmental.
What can I learn?
These sources have made it clear that:
- Pedagogy embracing and addressing the whole of the student has never been timely or needed in terms of the larger social, cultural and political context
- There has been a massive student response to similar pedagogy.
- The need has been recognised by other teaching practitioners
- Emotional trouble is not an exceptional issue and needs to be dealt with as such
They have also helped me form an idea of what relevant content might be:
- Mental and emotional, application of learning to life experiences/living
- Yr 1 focus needs to be on ‘Transition Anxiety’ which centres around entry into a new environment, belonging and socialisation
Highlighted what is necessary
- Positioning this content at the centre of the curriculum and embedded in discipline
- Student consultation on what they need
- A philosophy, strategy and key principles
And what to avoid:
- Potential pitfalls, what to avoid – taking over from other medical and social services