SU Senate backs mental health education initiative for next year
Posted February 9, 2009 at 7:33 pm
Student Union Senate, pictured here at a recent meeting, recently passed a resolution supporting MentalHealthEDU, a program designed to provide education on the signs of mental distress. (Stephanie Corda)
Student Union Senate passed a resolution this past Wednesday in support of a new educational program to teach members of the Washington University community how to spot students who may be in distress.
The program, MentalHealthEDU, was developed by Outside the Classroom, Inc., the same company that developed AlcoholEDU.
The University requires first-year and transfer students to complete AlcoholEDU, an online alcohol education program.
MentalHealthEDU and Alcohol EDU are similar in that they use the same structure and online interface.
Junior Anubodh Varshney, Student Health Services liaison for Student Union (SU) Senate, headed the resolution.
“It’s a program designed by college health experts that is supposed to teach faculty, student leaders and support staff how to discern warning signs of students in distress. It teaches you how to be proactive in figuring out when someone may be emotionally or mentally unstable and refer them to appropriate resources,” Varshney said.
The resolution says, “Student Union of Washington University strongly encourages the administration to require the completion of the MentalHealthEDU program by University faculty, support staff and student residential advisors and leaders.”
In order to pass the resolution, Varshney asked all SU senators to participate in the MentalHealthEDU program during winter break and offer their feedback this semester.
The resolution passed with unanimous support. Four senators abstained.
Some senators, however, felt that the program deserved further examination before being implemented.
“There were some concerns about the program not being the best program available. In terms of that, I’m pushing the Student Health Services administrators to keep looking for other programs as well. But since we have this one already contracted, it made sense to move to this one. Other objections were just ‘It’s kind of tedious,’ or ‘It’s not the most fun thing to do.’” Varshney said. “But I think it’s a serious topic, a serious issue, and it’s only a 30-minute thing so I think so these inconveniences can be overcome.”
Varshney feels that the best way to implement this program is through a gradual top-down approach. He said that the program could start with faculty, residential advisers, residential peer health educators and other student leaders before focusing on the general student body.
Student Health Services has been trying to publicize this program in conjunction with SU and is hoping that more students, staff and faculty take the time to complete it.
“The SU resolution is a nice show of student interest in this topic and student support for this resource,” said Assistant Director of Student Health Services and Chief of Health Promotion Services Melissa Ruwitch.
“We are not planning to require anyone to take it, but we believe that students, staff and faculty would be smart to take it, because the more members of the Wash. U. community who participate, the better prepared we will be to assist students who need help.”
Freshman Suzanne Mazhuvanchery is one student who thinks that the program would be beneficial while not mandating a large time commitment.
“I think it’s important because depression is actually pretty common among college students, so even if a student is not going through it herself, then I think it is really good that she is aware of the people around her,” she said.
In addition to the MentalHealthEDU program, SHS also provides stress reduction and prevention programs such as Stressbusters, stress management workshops and stress counseling, among other services.
MentalHealthEDU is free for all students. For any student interested in participating in MentalHealthEDU, a link is available at http://shs.wustl.edu/mentalHealth/mhedu.htm, where a login ID is provided to access the site.
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