College campuses have promoted more mental health initiatives in the past few years, especially since the start of the pandemic, but these are only band-aid solutions. Slapping a mental health talk on WebEx for students or sending a campus-wide email with the words, “We hope you are doing well in these unprecedented times,” does not acknowledge how these institutions themselves contribute to the declining mental health of not just students, but faculty and staff as well.
Telling those that form a part of the college campus that they should rest, does not mean that they are able to. We cannot rest because of the continued normalization of stress culture, which could also be called “hustle culture” and the required justification of absences. A possible reason a student missed class, is due to mental health issues, which might not be approved by the college as a justified absence.
Our academic achievements should not be the only aspect of us that is respected on campus, but our quality of life should be respected as well. College culture normalizes and glamorizes students, faculty and staff being overworked and sleep deprived. As students, we pride ourselves on academic achievement and extra-curricular achievement whether it be in Greek Life, a sport, or any student organization on campus, while neglecting our health and wellbeing.
It is very common to not eat some days, because we have so much work that we do not even have time to provide our body with a basic need: food. We can also find ourselves in an unhealthy cycle of sleepless nights because the never-ending list of things to do seems more important than rest- another basic need of the human body.
Even when it comes to social settings with friends, many feel it is more acceptable to say, “I cannot make it tonight because I have several assignments to do,” than to say, “I’m taking some time for my mental health tonight.” People view the first as respectable, and the second as lazy.
In society, and in academia especially, you are only worth what you contribute and how productive you are. Students are conditioned to think this way, but our professors struggle with this as well. They also grew up in an environment where “good work ethic” equals overworking themselves.
Universities can do the following for better student, faculty, and staff mental health:
1. Expand Counseling Services
There should be more efforts to raise funding to have a sufficient number of counselors on campus. Many times, students and professors must wait 2-3 weeks for their next counseling session because there is a very limited number of counselors. A lot can happen in those weeks and counseling is more effective when it happens on a weekly basis.
2. Encourage Healthy Learning
This article is not supposed to be against learning or productivity, because it can be a good thing- but once you base your worth off how much you can get done, that is the issue. Universities can work with instructional staff to design courses that challenge students without overwhelming them.
3. Take Preventative Measures
Universities should look at the factors that are contributing to stress, such as addiction, discrimination, sexual assault, and the pressure around one’s career, and then work to reduce their influence. Promoting resources for early intervention in these areas can help students and faculty to heal and develop healthy coping mechanisms.