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Have your say: Give mental health training to all university staff

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ThomH97
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Is there also an obligation on these staff members to do something with their training?

If I were afraid of being disciplined I'd report every student who "may be struggling with their mental health" but wouldn't know their names so a fat lot of good that would do. Or just pass out flyers with the Samaritans number on it to everyone.

This seems to be far too late a stage to intervene. If university requirements/demands/whatever are causing students to have mental breakdowns to want to kill themselves, that's the issue that needs sorting. As a species we haven't suddenly evolved to be suicidal without the support of a trained psychiatrist.
Original post by tam13
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You need to make a careful distinction between "can recognise a problem and know how to pass that on to the right people" and "can actively treat a student with MH issues". University staff are continually hit with major demands on their time (REF, TEF, KEF, NSS, teaching, publish or perish, win that grant, do outreach, support the community, chair this committee, run that journal etc) so you can't expect everyone to be able to pick up yet another job, particularly one with the potential to seriously damage a student if you get it wrong. Also, and with the best will in the world, not everyone has the empathy to deal with an MH issue, particularly if they themselves are under serious pressure. I really would not like to be "supported" by some of my colleagues.

Better in my opinion to take a three pronged approach.

1) Make sure that staff have clear guidance on what to look for and who to contact when a student has issues. That certainly happens at my institution.

2) Have a clearly signposted internal system of support with properly trained professional MH staff that you can hand problem cases over to as soon as you approach the limit of your personal capabilities to help.

3) Recognise that universities are not the NHS and cannot and should not try to manage students with serious medical conditions. There are times when it's better to put a student on interruption of studies with the hope that they can return in better shape - or drop them from a degree entirely for their own good. The support for any long term intervention and recovery then has to be from outside the university.

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