Review: Higher Ed Mental Health Data

Now that we have reflected on our personal experiences with mental wellbeing, let’s examine some general statistics on mental health in academia gathered from surveys and peer-reviewed research. Flip through this short slide deck and think about how the mental health statistics and excerpts from the literature compare to your expectations based on personal experience (while remembering that these numbers and insights are based on surveys and questionnaires—no metric is perfect or universal). Additionally (and optionally), consider:

• What does the prevalence of mental health issues say about higher ed’s institutional and cultural prioritization of student wellbeing?
• How can we, as instructors, TAs, and/or students, intervene?
• Are there institutional structures or norms that prevent you from intervening as you would like (e.g., prevent you from implementing your “ideal classroom” from the previous module)?

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Module 1 Overview