Term 1 overview

What have we been doing this term? Good question, the Mental Health Network team have been working really hard on creating new events for the next couple of terms, and been making changes to our team.

We set off this term at freshers week, if you saw us there you may have noticed that we were giving out paper leaflets, well, the week after that we received from the publisher, the final copy. Keep an eye out for them around the uni, in Student services centre, wellbeing and at the SU. We wrote and produced these leaflets with the help of the SU, and these are a handy guide to mental health helplines and services targeted at Royal Holloway Students.

Freshers week ended and we immediately jumped into Mental Health Awareness week, during this week we ran mural making (see the pictures for the final images) where we aimed to raise awareness of 'what mental health awareness means to you' and body image positivity. We did this by asking people to write on a mirror one thing that they liked about themselves, a challenge that I highly recommend one does every so often, its much harder than it seems. We also asked people to write down what mental health awareness means to them, which resulted in some amazing statements (personal favourites include quotes from Finding Nemo and Harry Potter). On Wednesday of this week, we sat down with Holly Hughes to collaborate on her project of mental heath peer support training, which has now been rolled out to loads of committee members. A very successful (ongoing) project which we congratulate Holly for. We ended the week with a traditional 'Let's talk about mental health' event. Though a small event, we felt that this was really hard hitting and we discussed some very poignant topics and brought up some very interesting points of discussion.

Once awareness week ended we then launched our website! Though it is still a work in progress, this is a really exciting resource for us now and allows us more freedom to create resources for the student population and keep everyone up to date with what we do. Have a browse at rhulmhn.wixsite.com.

We then set our minds to expanding our team, and set about hiring campaign assistants. A position that has been around since last year, but we have decided to further the role of the assistants, who will be running their own events and campaigns as part of the network, with support from the Chair, Vice Chair and members of the SU. Congratulations to Georgia Evans, Jonah Maloney and Georgina Curtis! We were really overwhelmed by how many people applied and the strength of the applications. We have now had training for them and will be working on their campaigns as well as others in future.

Additionally to this we launched a survey (https://www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/YM29WMP) to gather feedback from students about their experiences of mental health services across the university. Which brought up some really interesting comments on the services. In response to this we will be sitting down with members of the SU, college and student advisory services alongside the other student reps to discuss with them ways in which they can improve their service and establish a feedback system. If you want to add your feedback to this please get in contact with us, you can fill out the survey or message our facebook page or instagram (@rhulmhn) .

We attended the Psychology department's Wellbeing fayre, a really great project run by the department which we hope to see built upon in following years. We may be biased because there were free mince pies, and a bake off....

As for planning for the next couple of terms, we have a number of things going on. To kick off, we have a lecture series on different aspects of mental health, including; depression, mindfulness, autism, LGTBQ+ and schizophrenia. The events are live now on the SU website and are all free to attend. The lectures will be given by a mix of leading experts in their field and individuals with personal experience. We hope to see you there!

We will be working collaboratively with film soc to produce a mini film depicting a students' experience of mental health, which we can't wait to see! Script writing is taking place now so more information to come.

One of our team has also sat down with Renee Landell to discuss how we can make the network more inclusive, responding to comments that we are not inclusive/ do not do enough outreach to members of the BME community. In response to this we will be collaborating with BME focused groups to work with them in outreach and engagement as well as improving mental health awareness within the communities, to help reduce stigma. If you want to get involved with us on this, then please get in touch!

Finally, we will be planning for the final term and formalising individual campaigns. Other items of note are Holly Hughes' male mental health campaign, in February, keep an eye out for her events, we highly recommend them.

Please get in contact with anything you have comments on or ideas you may have and ways you would like to get involved!