Toward better student mental health: a guide for supporting change in our institutions

In recent years, data on student mental health in university and college  settings has been piling up, and all of it seems to tell a similar tale: students are facing formidable challenges. It is crucial that we support students and call into question the culture and practices that contribute to the mental health burden.  

Institutions across Canada are aligning their practices with the National Standard for Mental Health and Well-Being for Post-Secondary Students, which aims to help them support best practices among PSE institutions. 

In Quebec, the Ministry of Higher Education (MES, Ministère de l’Enseignement supérieur) has developed its own set of guidelines in the form of an Action Plan for Student Mental Health in Higher Education (Plan d’action sur la santé mentale étudiante en enseignement supérieur [PASME] 2021-2026) and a Student Mental Health Framework (Cadre de référence sur la santé mentale étudiante), and urged institutions to implement practices and measures (initiatives, programs, policies, learning environment changes) that support student well-being and foster a thriving mental health environment on campus. Both initiatives emphasize the importance of adopting a systems-based approach in the implementation of practices and measures across a broader continuum (from mental health promotion to action) that targets not only students but also institutional structures and climates.  

Why is it so important to support institutions through this major shift? 

Implementing new, promising practices for student mental health across system levels entails mobilizing many people within a postsecondary institution. With that broader perspective in mind, the Observatory on Mental Health for Students in Higher Education (OSMÉES, Observatoire sur la santé mentale étudiante en enseignement supérieur) has rolled out a guide for accompanying continual improvement in student mental health practices in post-secondary institutions designed to support higher education institutions in implementing practices and measures that promote student well-being and foster a thriving mental health environment on campus.  

How to support an institution?  

OSMÉES’ guide breaks down the information in an easily digestible format that explains how to adopt a coaching posture, showing exactly how to implement practices and measures in a higher education setting. The first section of the guide outlines the coaching approach to bring about a change in practices and further engage people in supporting student mental health. This posture involves adopting the role of a facilitator and is geared towards mobilizing the strengths, expertise and autonomy of the people being coached, empowering them to deepen their reflections on the matter. It also recommends avoiding acting as an expert, i.e., not transmitting one’s own vision and expertise to the people being coached. When supporting a change in practices, the practitioner may alternate between an expert posture and a coaching posture as long as the goal is to strengthen qualities of self-efficacy, autonomy, openness, mobilization, support and mutual trust. Adopting a coaching posture also means establishing trust-based relationships. This guide will help gain awareness around trust and provide the tools to develop intrapersonal trust (so the person doing the coaching is perceived as trustworthy, competent and committed to their goals) and interpersonal trust (so they are seen as someone who cultivates cooperation and reciprocity in the pursuit of those goals). 

The guide’s second section offers a multi-step process (see Figure 1) to foster the continual improvement of practices supporting student mental health in postsecondary institutions. This process draws from the widely known and recognized Knowledge-to-Action (KTA) Framework. The proposed steps should be considered as iterative and not necessarily sequential, as sometimes it is essential to go a step back to refine a particular action.   

For each step in the coaching process, OSMÉES’ guide offers a short description and a table with concrete, actionable items written in compelling and clear terms. At the end, a second table illustrates the step using real-life examples from higher education settings. 

We hope you find this guide useful. Stay tuned for our upcoming knowledge mobilization activities for this guide and sign up for our newsletter so you won’t miss a thing!  

SEE ALSO: Station santé mentale étudiante : un soutien pour le bien-être au Québec (in French) 

Julie Lane is an Assistant Professor at Université de Sherbrooke, Co-Director of the Observatory on Mental Health for Students in Higher Education (OSMÉES, Observatoire sur la santé mentale étudiante en enseignement supérieur), and Director of the RBC Centre for University Expertise in Mental Health (Centre RBC d’expertise universitaire en santé mentale). 

Félix Guay-Dufour is an Occupational and Organizational Psychologist, as well as Coordinator at OSMÉES. 

This article is part of a monthly series on student mental health in higher education supported by OSMÉES (Observatoire sur la santé mentale étudiante en enseignement supérieur) and ISMÉ (Initiative sur la santé mentale étudiante en enseignement supérieur).