Students Take Part In University Mental Health And Well-Being Day

On Wednesday 23rd of February students at Glyndwr took part in the ‘University and Mental Health Well-being Day’.

The annual event held on the third Wednesday of February, aims to focus efforts aimed at promoting the mental health of people who study and work in higher education. The event was organised by the university’s Student Services; with Mental Health Advisor from Disability, Paul Harvey co-ordinating the event.

Staff from Funding and Welfare, the Student’s Guild, Sport and Recreation and Complementary Therapies joined together to offer information and advice to students. Throughout the day students had the opportunity to experience free complimentary therapy sessions, enter a free prize draw, make a pledge to their mental health and contribute to a ‘Mindapple Tree’.

A special wooden tree to hang the Mindapples  was made especially for the occasion. Similar to a ‘five a day for the body’, the Mindapples tree allowed students to share their ‘five a day for the mind’; writing what they do to make themselves happy and to take care of their mental health. This involved ideas such as: eating proper meals, hugging their grandfather, having a cup of tea; along with one student saying the Mindapple tree made them happy.

Counsellor at Glyndwr University Gail Ashton said: “I think it gave hope to a lot of students. I think that students loved being part of the day and enjoyed what the tree represented.  Some said they were not sure what they do or they are not sure what helps. Then they looked at some of the apples that students had put on and said “yes, I do that” or “oh, that’s a good idea”.  There was a lot of laughter too as some students had some fun ideas about what they do to look after their minds. Students sat filling in cards while eating their lunch, some went off to lectures and brought them back to us, others sat and discussed with a group of friends and compared ideas. It was inspiring!”

As the pressure of finance is something that can have an impact on students and their mental health, members of the university’s Student Funding and Welfare Team were also at the event with a money tree. The team gave advice to students on how to shop wisely and dinner in a bag; along with financial advice, free gifts and a money tree encouraging students to put money savings tips on.

A tweet about the event, along with an image of the mind apples was later retweeted by Downtown Abbey’s Hugh Bonneville, who has over 100,000 followers on Twitter.

More information on the events can be found at: http://www.umhan.com/uni-mental-health-day.html