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Today the Office for Students (OfS) has announced the “OfS Challenge Competition: Achieving a step change in mental health outcomes for all students”. The Office for Students, through this new competition, is inviting higher education providers to deliver new and innovative collaborative approaches to improving mental health outcomes for students.
We are delighted to see that the OfS is championing the importance of student mental health, through supporting universities to work in partnership with other Higher Education Institutions and other organisations including education providers such as schools and colleges, health agencies, third sector organisations, and other stakeholders to innovate in this area. With around £6m of funding, the competition aims to generate new approaches which can be used across higher education. Proposals could support:
Higher Education providers are invited to express their interest by the 7th of November 2018. You can read more about the OfS Challenge Competition on their website. If you want to know more about our work at Student Minds across these objectives contact policy@studentminds.org.uk
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What is SMaRteN?
SMaRteN is a UKRI funded national research network, led by KCL, focusing on Student Mental Health in Higher Education. The network’s aim is to connect researchers, with a range of expertise, with key stakeholders across the Higher Education sector to improve our understanding of student mental health. The Higher Education sector has recently seen increases in the levels of mental distress among the student population. In response, we are seeing a substantive push for programmes of change. For this change to be strategic and effective, it needs to be based on solid research and evidence. One of the key asks of the Universities UK #StepChange framework is for universities to use the internal data that they have at their university, to better assess the their population, and facilitate preventative and proactive responses. The network aims to shift the focus away from responsive counselling and support services to use data to build an understanding of what institutional and social factors contribute to distress among the student population. Using data to support a whole university approach, we expect institutions to be able to reduce levels of distress so that fewer students feel they need to access professional services. This network is an opportunity to further build the case for investing in transforming the mental health of our university communities. The network will engage researchers with expertise in areas ranging from education to anthropology, from arts and culture to bio-informatics, from psychology to economics. We will take a new look at both the individual and institutional factors that influence student mental health. How are Student Minds involved? Student Minds has always worked to ensure that our work Is evidence based and driven by research. This is why we are thrilled to be the lead charity partner in the SMaRteN research network. Our founder and Chair of Trustees, Dr. Nicola Byrom is leading the network. As a member of the network’s Management Team, our Policy Manager, Rachel Piper will work with the network to ensure that student voice is meaningfully engaged throughout the process, through a Student Led Research Team. You can read more about the team, and find out how to apply here. Student Minds’ CEO, Rosie Tressler, will be joining international experts, including Professor Stan Kutcher and Professor Daniel Eisenberg, and UK sector leaders from Universities UK and AMOSHEE, to provide advice to the network. Researchers, practitioners and students can join the network by filling out a form on their website. We welcome the launch of 'Suicide Safer Universities', Universities UK and Papyrus’ guidance for universities on preventing student suicides focused on improving understanding, prevention and responses to the tragic circumstances of suicide. This guide, which will be sent to all university leaders, is a helpful step to ensure practice is shared across the sector.
At Student Minds, we also call for further research and evidence in this area and will be supporting the dissemination of a number of studies in the coming years. There have been recent debates about degree to which a parent, guardian, or other trusted adult should be informed about a student in crisis, at risk, having disclosed a mental health difficulty or using services. We would recommend that responses to this debate are at all times both informed by available evidence and co-produced with students. Across universities and the NHS we must invest in ensuring the early identification and treatment of mental health disorders, as too many people still lose their lives when waiting for treatment. We also recognise that the media has a big role to play to ensure that all reporting is safe and responsible and adheres to Samaritans guidelines in order to not create harm for others. We understand that it's not easy for any students, family members or members of the university community to read about these very difficult issues and we encourage anyone affected to look after yourself and reach out to others if required (please see links provided below). Are you looking for support? Research into student mental health suggests that broad support networks can help recovery from, and management of, mental health difficulties. Your wider support network might include friends and family, your GP, University counselling / wellbeing services.
Are you feeling actively suicidal? If you are feeling like you want to die, please consider that many people who have attempted or come close to suicide look back with gratitude that they were not successful in acting on their intentions. If you are feeling actively suicidal now:
Today I’m thrilled to announce a key milestone in our mission to transform the state of student mental health; Student Minds’ head office will be relocating to West Yorkshire, and we’re recruiting for several new staff to join our growing team!
Why the move? At Student Minds we have ambitions to be be revolutionary in the spheres of youth health, higher education, and charity workplace culture. Moving our head office to Leeds supports plans to; grow our staff team, develop a range of university, Students’ Union and health partnerships in the north, and support the quality of life of our employees. We will of course continue delivering our activities right across the UK, but we’re looking forward to making such a vibrant, diverse and developing city our base. Over the coming months it will be business as usual for Student Minds, taking a phased approach to the relocation whilst continuing to work from our Oxford office until Christmas. We’ll let you know when we’re settled in our new home. Come work with us! If you want to work with a vibrant, highly motivated and supportive team working to improve the mental health and wellbeing of students and higher education community, Student Minds could be the organisation for you. You’ll be joining us at a time where we’re embarking on a range of exciting programmes, from growing our student-powered mental health movement to developing the University Mental Health Charter. We’re currently recruiting for 6 new roles: Executive Assistant, Fundraising Officer, Head of Development, Programme Manager (University Mental Health Charter), Training Network Officer and Volunteer Officer (Peer Support). Do you know someone that would make a great addition to our team? Find out more about the roles and how you can join us in transforming the state of student mental health here. Thank you for your support and for helping us to find the rest of our dream team! Rosie Tressler and the Student Minds team  Fundamental to a student’s experience at university is where they live and this can have a large impact on their mental health and wellbeing. Building on our existing work with the student accommodation sector, we’ll be working with Student.com to reach smaller landlords across the UK.
At Student Minds we want all student accommodation providers and landlords to understand their role in supporting students to thrive at university. Over the past few years we have been working with several accommodation providers to make this a reality. In 2017 we worked with UPP and Nottingham Trent University, to develop a training scheme for front-line staff, funded thanks to the UPP Foundation. We then publicly shared our learning in our Student Living report to equip the sector with recommendations for supporting student mental health and wellbeing. We have also worked with UNITE who sponsored University Mental Health Day 2018 and share student’s experiences of mental health difficulties to really highlight the student voice on their blog, to fundraising with CRM Students and GSA, to training staff members at GSA. Through our new partnership with Student.com we will be influencing the approaches of smaller landlords across the UK. In the Autumn, we will be providing training in the form of an online webinar and an offline session hosted at Student.com’s office. Luke Nolan, founder and CEO of Student.com commented “With Student Minds’ expertise and Student.com’s wide-reaching landlord network, we are confident that our partnership will help empower even more accommodation providers to prioritise student mental health. We chose Student Minds as our official charity partner because of their strong expertise and experience in student mental health, and we’re proud to support their work with a donation from Student.com.” We are looking forward to seeing a real change in the sector. Rosie Tressler, CEO of Student Minds shared "It has been great to see a number of large student accommodation providers working to improve student mental health and using our ‘Student Living’ toolkit over the last few years, but we recognise the importance and reach of smaller landlords across the UK. Together, we need to work on preventing difficulties and ensuring students can thrive during their time at university. This partnership with Student.com will allow us to take an important step towards this goal.” Today, half of all young people in the UK go to university. Whilst the student experience can be full of new experiences and mark the exciting journey into adulthood, many students struggle with the initial transition from school or college into university. At many universities, drop-out rates of first year students have risen for a third consecutive year (HESA) and UK universities have seen an increase in demand for student mental health support services. In response to the challenge, we have collaborated with Canadian organisation TeenMentalHealth.Org (led by internationally-renowned psychiatrist Dr. Stan Kutcher) to ensure that this period of transition is met with information, support and guidance which supports students to succeed in their studies. Dr. Stan Kutcher, TeenMentalHealth.Org added; “We’re thrilled to be partnering with Student Minds who share our goal of improving mental health outcomes for youth by promoting mental health literacy in schools. These resources have been developed and well researched in Canada demonstrating positive outcomes and we look forward to seeing the same results across the UK.” Today, on 6th June, we launch two resources, the first evidence-based publications of their kind in the UK, freely available to students and educators at schools and universities. Both resources help students to better visualise and prepare for their future, with topics such as; time management, relationships, identity, finances, sexual activity, mental illness, suicide, addictions, and more. ‘Know Before You Go’ provides age-appropriate guidance to young people before they leave school or college, and ‘Transitions’ contains information to support the first few years in Higher Education. Find out how you can use the resources to support your students. About the importance of the resources, Student Minds Chief Executive, Rosie Tressler commented: “Student mental health can be most vulnerable at points of transition, but with the right support it doesn’t need to be. Until today there has been a gap in the UK for engaging resources which really speak to sixth form, college and university students about this time of change. Whilst we’re pleased that many universities are working towards strategic approaches to mental health and better connections with the NHS, to truly tackle these issues all of our schools, colleges and universities need to bridge the transition points. We’re calling on all education institutions to share these free, online resources with their students. There’s no reason that every school and university in the UK can’t share them with their students to give them the best start to university life." We’re delighted to have collaborated with Teen Mental Health.org and Southern Universities Network to make this a reality - thanks to these partnerships we can now provide open access resources for all students to support them with the transition to university.
Today sees the launch of new guidance focused on addressing one of the greatest challenges in student mental health - the coordination of care between the NHS and universities.
Over the last eight months, Universities UK have convened a Services Task Group, including representation from Student Minds and colleagues across the health system, to develop good practice frameworks for services and clinicians to address the variation that exists and improve mental health care for further and higher education students. Student Minds have been working with our partners to ensure students’ experiences are at the heart of the approach, supporting the design of a student facing questionnaire and involving evidence from our previous research project ‘University Challenge’(1). The lived experiences in this guidance really highlight that NHS services are not currently adapted to the transient nature of student life, and that there is little targeted support for the specific needs of students. For instance one parent who commented; “My daughter is in her first semester of her first year at university…our experience is a disjointed, complicated, stressful and timely one, with my observation that I have provided the role of case worker to help join up the dots, communicate and facilitate her best use of the help that’s out there. I can see how a sufferer can very easily slip through the net without this support and motivation.” About the guidance, Student Minds’ Chief Executive, Rosie Tressler commented; “The launch of today’s guidance for NHS leaders is an important milestone in transforming the state of student mental health. Not a week goes by without us hearing from either a student or a parent desperately trying to advocate for support in a system that is not currently set up for student life and the transitional nature of this health population of 2.3 million. It’s important that the difficulties students experience in transitioning from home to university health services are brought to the forefront for NHS professionals. Whilst there are examples of best practice in some cities, a postcode lottery for student support exists. This guidance starts the conversation on how change can be achieved, putting at the heart of it a focus on prevention, collaboration, co-production with students, and a recognition of responding to the diversity of the student population. We look forward to seeing how the 'place-based' partnership approaches which are taking place in areas such as Greater Manchester, Bristol and North London can expand, to ensure across the UK our health systems respond to the needs of students and transform young people’s futures.” Note: (1) Back in 2013, Student Minds undertook research to assess the impact of university transitions on access to treatment for students with eating disorders. This led to a report ‘University Challenge’, which involved engaging students, professionals and other key stakeholders in exploring the challenges students face. The research highlighted Recognising this we launched a campaign calling on the Department of Health to fill the gaps in student mental health support, and over 2,200 of our supporters signed a petition which called on the Department of Health to address the specific needs of students. Thank you to all of the students, parents, health professionals, press ambassadors, and wider supporters that have taken part at all stages of this work to reach today’s important milestone.  This month UWE launched its Mental Wealth First Initiative, setting out its strategic response to a whole university approach to mental health and wellbeing, in response to the StepChange framework. We have been working with UWE, York and Cardiff to support students to input into their strategy development. Student Minds Policy Manager, Rachel Piper, spoke at the launch event. In this post we share some of her key messages and a recording of her speech. We believe that those with lived experience of mental health difficulties - the ones receiving, seeking or in need of support - are experts by experience, and therefore should be active participants and partners in shaping a whole university approach to mental health and wellbeing at their institutions. At Student Minds, we are excited to be empowering a movement of students to advocate for change towards positive mental health and wellbeing at their universities. We have enjoyed supporting the development of UWE’s Mental Wealth First initiative to involve students in codesign and co-production. The HEFCE funded programme has also supported us to work with Cardiff and York, and Universities UK to look at the best ways for effective collaboration between students and universities. From this we are learning about what works, and we will be sharing this with the sector. The activities require careful training and support to ensure this is a positive and empowering experience for those taking part and set within the wider national context about student wellbeing. Universities must foster genuinely supportive environments which empower those with lived experience to contribute to choices around service and provision delivery, and input into health strategies at the university. This should not be about putting the onus of campaigning for adequate support on those that are experiencing mental health difficulties, but rather, providing ample and clear opportunity for all students to contribute. Our full report about co-producing with students on strategy is launching later this year. Today there have been a number of reports in the media about a research study looking at data on student deaths by suicide. We understand that it's not easy for any students, family members or members of the university community to read about these very difficult issues and we encourage anyone affected to look after yourself and reach out to others if required (please see links provided below).
At Student Minds we are working with a number of organisations to improve prevention, but we know there is a lot more to be done and won't stop until every university and health providers have implemented national evidence - based guidance. There is also more that we need to understand as a society in order to respond from an informed starting point, and we are eager to hear the findings from research being undertaken in a few universities in the UK. We think it’s important to also note that there has been some debate between academics around the methodology and possible assumptions underlying the particular study being shared this week, and anticipate there will be further analysis and discussion in the future as more data becomes available. We encourage sensitivity from anyone reporting on these issues in the meantime, remembering that we all have a responsibility to ensure we do not put other people at risk. Guidance on safe reporting is available on the Samaritans website. Are you looking for support? Research into student mental health suggests that broad support networks can help recovery from, and management of, mental health difficulties. Your wider support network might include friends and family, your GP, University counselling / wellbeing services.
Are you feeling actively suicidal? If you are feeling like you want to die, please consider that many people who have attempted or come close to suicide look back with gratitude that they were not successful in acting on their intentions. If you are feeling actively suicidal now:
Student Minds call on universities to review the role of academics in student mental health29/1/2018  Student Minds works with various members of the university community; students, Student Services staff, Students’ Union colleagues and University Sport and accommodation staff. Through these networks and a number of our research projects (Grand Challenges, Student Voice Forum), recurring concerns have arisen about the role of academics in supporting student mental health. In response, in 2016 we commissioned research to be undertaken directly with academics to better understand their experiences.
Today we release the findings of this research, with the launch of our report Student Mental Health: The Role and Experience of Academics which provides new insights into the role of academics in supporting student mental health. The report authors, Dr Nicola Bryom and Gareth Hughes, interviewed 52 academics with diverse experience, at five universities. These academics identified that responding to student mental health problems is now an inevitable part of the academic role. However, this crucial frontline role is currently invisible, and the higher education sector does not currently have the appropriate structures or cultures to assist academics. Researcher, Dr Nicola Byrom, told us “Interviewing people for this project, I was struck by the depth of care and concern most academics felt for their students and by the deep sense of frustration felt in the situations where adequate support was not readily available for students.’ What does this mean for universities? In 2017 Universities UK published the #StepChange framework, encouraging leaders across the Higher Education sector to take a whole university approach in response to student mental health. Many universities are now developing their response to Step Change. Our research demonstrates that academics need to be a priority area within the development of an institution's mental health strategy and their wider organisational strategy. Academics are often a student’s key point of contact , and this interaction can significantly impact on a student’s experience. For a university to progress towards a whole-university approach, they must ensure that the role of academics in relation to student mental health is functioning well. One of the report authors, Gareth Hughes, commented: ‘"I hope this research helps us all to think a bit more clearly about what we mean by a whole university approach to mental health. For me personally, there are four key lessons from this report; 1. we need to be clear about what we expect of the academic role, 2. we need to recognise that signposting is a complex task, 3 we need closer working relationships between academics and student services and 4. across the sector, students services need to be resourced so they can meet the needs of students, so that academics aren't put in situations where they are providing this level of support to students."’ We hope that this report encourages universities to recognise the benefits of providing additional support to students and academic departments around mental health - such as resourcing senior academics to put in structures to support the wellbeing of their staff. . This will have a range of positive outcomes for students, staff and the institution. As Dr Nicola Byrom points out ‘Our research indicated that resourcing Student Support Services could free up academic time and energy for teaching and research while ensuring better outcomes for students and reducing institutional risk.’ Commenting on the research, Rosie Tressler, CEO of Student Minds said, ‘This research is the first study to really get to grips with the role of academics within student mental health - both the positives and the challenges of this. Evidently Academics are a vital but often unrecognised part of the support available to students at universities. Students will reach out to whoever they feel comfortable with, so in order to ensure that students get quick access to support, institutions must support academics to be mental health literate and have roles with clear boundaries, whilst improving collaboration between academia and student services. This must be backed on a strategic level through a whole university approach to student mental health and wellbeing. This work wouldn’t have been possible without the openess and honesty of academics and students. We hope that senior university leaders will follow our lead and ensure they truly co-produce their solutions and strategies with those who are on the frontline, as that’s how we’ll transform the health of the university community.” For a full list of recommendations and the report visit: www.studentminds.org.uk/theroleofanacademic |
