The ‘Institute of Public Policy’ found levels of mental illness, mental distress and low wellbeing to be higher amongst students than they are in the general population. In addition, the number of students who “have disclosed a mental health condition to their university has increased dramatically in the past 10 years”. Poor mental health/low wellbeing can have an impact on student’s academic performance and in some cases, can lead to students not continuing with their studies and in the worst scencario, can also lead to death by suicide for some students. Unfortunately, Universities differ in the extent to which they are ready and resourced to deal with poor mental health and reduced wellbeing in students, which may leave some students unsupported.
The Enlitened App
Some of you were kind enough recently to congratulate me on my new role with ‘The Student Room’. This role is in addition to my role as Director of Cognoscenti Business Psychologists and it has involved me working with ‘ The Student Room’ to design an App (called ‘Enlitened’) which is designed to increase the mental health literacy of students and provide them with advice and guidance, if they experience reduced wellbeing or poor mental health. The App also provides summary information to the Universites so that they have a better understanding of the mental health of their student body. The Universities can also use data from the App as an early warning system to alert them to the existence of vulnerable students who would benefit from Wellbeing Services support. The Enlitened App was recently featured in a Financial Times article, which you can read here: The Enlitened App to facilitate student wellbeing
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