Navigate Student Mental Health in Today's College Classroom
Mar 01, 2023
SAGE US College
A conversation with Dr. Dawn M. McBride, SAGE author, professor of psychology at Illinois State University, and recipient of the Illinois State University Teaching Initiative Award and the Illinois State University SPA/Psi Chi Jim Johnson Award for commitment to undergraduate mentorship, involvement, and achievement.
Dr. McBride shares insights from mental health conversations with her Introduction to Psychology students, trends she's noticing in today's college classrooms, and strategies she has implemented in her classroom to promote mental wellness.
A conversation with Dr. Dawn M. McBride, SAGE author, professor of psychology at Illinois State University, and recipient of the Illinois State University Teaching Initiative Award and the Illinois State University SPA/Psi Chi Jim Johnson Award for commitment to undergraduate mentorship, involvement, and achievement.
Dr. McBride shares insights from mental health conversations with her Introduction to Psychology students, trends she's noticing in today's college classrooms, and strategies she has implemented in her classroom to promote mental wellness.
Victoria Velasquez, Product Marketing Manager for Psychology at SAGE Publishing:
Hello, everyone. My name is Victoria Velasquez. I'm the Product Marketing Manager for psychology at SAGE Publishing. And today I am excited to be speaking to Dawn McBride. She is a professor and the Graduate Assistantship coordinator in the Department of Psychology at Illinois State University. She has taught interest psychology many times over the past 25 years of her career, mostly to first semester psychology majors. And she is the co author of psychology, seventh edition published by SAGE. Welcome, Dawn, I'm so happy to speak to you. I'd love to ask you a few questions on the topic of mental health and get your insights from your experience teaching your students in intro psychology.
Dawn McBride, SAGE Author:
Certainly, thanks for having me. This is actually a really important topic that's come up among faculty in the last few years, especially since the pandemic has really I think, increased the level of anxiety in our students in a lot of ways. So it's a really important topic to address.
Victoria Velasquez, Product Marketing Manager for Psychology at SAGE Publishing:
Yeah, I certainly agree. Can you talk a little bit about your students and what you have noticed over the past few years in terms of how they're talking about mental health, how they're dealing with mental health?
Dawn McBride, SAGE Author:
Yes. So basically, what faculty are describing is that students are reporting to them, that they have higher levels of anxiety, especially at stressful times during the semester midterms, and so forth. They seem to be having a harder time, I think, dealing with some of sort of life's daily stressors as a student. And we've noticed that level of anxiety, just as a sort of quick anecdote, one of the courses I teach as well is a research methods course. And there are a lot of assignments in this course, the students are constantly practicing those research skills and doing various things that they need to submit for score in the class. And I've taught that class probably once a year, in my entire career at Illinois State, which is this is my 25th year. So a lot of sections of that course. And just in the last couple of years, I have noticed students indicating that the number of assignments is making them feel very stressed to try to keep up with the course along with their other courses. And this is a change from a few just a few years ago, students seem to be handling it better in that time, and are able to were able to keep up a little bit better.
Victoria Velasquez, Product Marketing Manager for Psychology at SAGE Publishing:
And can you talk about what advice you maybe give to your students when you see them struggling with their mental health? Or if they have lots of questions about mental health?
Dawn McBride, SAGE Author:
Yes, it's not always easy to give advice, especially if your background and expertise area is not in mental health as mine isn't. My area of expertise is in cognition, particularly memory. But over years of experience in teaching students and and trying to help them through some of their struggles, some of the things I do tell them is to do things like try to organize their schedule a little bit, try to schedule time, at least a little bit for each class within their schedule each week, so that they don't feel suddenly overwhelmed when they've got a large assignment due or they suddenly are at a due date time. And they have so many things to do with that. But also to make sure that they take time out to do some things for themselves, have maybe some quiet time or exercise or things like that, so that they aren't feeling sort of that much stress all the time about their schoolwork and their academic pursuits.
Victoria Velasquez, Product Marketing Manager for Psychology at SAGE Publishing:
Yeah, that's great advice. I think we could all certainly use some of those tips right in their lives. Do you have any resources or assignments that you've implemented in your intro psychology course to help address some of these issues?
Dawn McBride, SAGE Author:
Yes, when I first taught intro psych during the pandemic, for In fact, I was teaching an intro psych to first semester psychology majors in fall of 2020, which was a tough semester for both faculty and students as pretty much everything was online, and students were just coming into college at a time When everything was changing in terms of how we teach them and some of the issues that they were dealing with in their daily lives. And so one of the first things I did in that course was create a sort of one page document that had answers to all kinds of questions that students might ask, like, what do I do if I feel myself struggling? Where do I go to it on campus? For example, if I need some legal help, or legal advice? Where do I go, if for some reason I am finding myself food insecure, where can I go in the community or on campus, and that sort of one page document, I just let them know what's there posted in the course, and hoped that that might be a place that some students can go when they are really struggling with something that they may not always want to talk to others about. So in some cases, students are reluctant to come to faculty and tell them what is going on with themselves, they sometimes feel or worry that this is going to look like an excuse or, or something that they're not handling well. And so I figured that document would be there for any students who wanted to, you know, take a look at it didn't necessarily want to tell people about their problems. The link to our counseling center was on there, for example, so that they could know where to go if they needed to get an appointment for that, as well as many other things like if they needed an accommodation for something to get to our access accommodations office, and so forth. And it seemed like a pretty simple thing to do to just help students find the information they needed in one place, because it can be tough. Sometimes, if you're stressed out and trying to look for things, websites don't always, you know, help you get where you need to go. What I do in a lot of my classes is check in with them, maybe a third of the way or halfway through the semester, where I just post sort of an optional survey might be just for a couple extra credit points. Or I might just post it and say, Hey, if you want to report anything, it could be about the course like things you're struggling with in the course, it could be about things they're struggling with overall, that they might need help with. And I always kind of put a last question at the bottom that says, Would you like to meet with document bride for any reason? And if they click yes, then I reach out to them and make an appointment with them. And I let them know that in the question that if you click yes, then I will be checking in with you. And we'll be happy to set up a time to meet with you to talk about whatever it is you want to talk about. So those sort of check ins have actually helped me keep an idea of how the students are doing not just in my class, but just how they're doing in general, as we go through the semester.
Victoria Velasquez, Product Marketing Manager for Psychology at SAGE Publishing:
That's great. It sounds like it's kind of a low pressure way for them to know that they can come to you for help. When of course, sometimes it's hard reaching out to your professors, right? Absolutely. No, you're struggling. That's great. And, of course, we're you know, we're talking about student mental health, which is very important. But professors are also dealing with a lot of these issues. You know, they've been under stress the past few years. Are there any tips or advice you want to give to professors to help them manage their own mental health?
Dawn McBride, SAGE Author:
Yeah, that's that questions a little bit harder. Faculty have a tendency to overwork a little bit sometimes, because there aren't real clear boundaries in terms of our work time. But, you know, some good advice for that might be something like, only look at your email until you know, six or 7pm in the evening. And don't try to you know, check it when you're gearing down and getting ready to go to sleep. Make sure you have that good sort of work life balance as much as you can take some time out to do some things for yourself on your own, as much as you can. For me during the pandemic, it was puzzles. So it was a it was a good way to kind of relieve some stress. And I can keep my mind working a little bit while I do the puzzles, and in some cases, think through some of the issues that are related to the work that I've got going on. But I think just taking some time for yourself is important to do, so that you don't feel too overwhelmed.
Victoria Velasquez, Product Marketing Manager for Psychology at SAGE Publishing:
Yes, definitely. Again, advice we can all use, I think in our lives. Well, thank you so much, Dawn, for taking the time to talk to me today about this important topic. It's always great to hear from our authors, the ones that you know, are talking to students every day. Do you have any final thoughts or parting words you want to revisit before we sign off here?
Dawn McBride, SAGE Author:
No, I think we've covered some really important topics here and I'm always happy to discuss ways to teach our students and help them feel connected both to a course and to the faculty who care about their well being.
Victoria Velasquez, Product Marketing Manager for Psychology at SAGE Publishing: