Each year, toward the beginning of March, the UK celebrates its annual University Mental Health Day: an awareness event committed to making student mental health a university-wide priority.

This year’s event, taking place on Thursday, March 14, is a particularly potent one for institutions across the country, as they strive to meet the September 2024 deadline set by Higher Education Minister Robert Halfon to place student mental health at the forefront of their mission and sign up for the University Mental Health Charter Programme, lest they open the door for tighter legislation on the matter.

In truth, far too many universities in the UK are currently failing to appropriately respond to the rapidly increasing student mental health crisis. After a petition calling for a statutory duty of care for students in higher education received an excess of over 128,000 signatures, a survey of more than 1,500 of those petitioners unearthed a litany of testimonies regarding “appalling” and unacceptable behaviour from universities, such as:

• Limiting students’ access to counselling to a mere six sessions throughout their entire time on campus;
• Boasting wait times of over six months to a full academic year for those counselling services;
• Failing to act when a student did not turn up to a single lecture all term;
• Failing to contact parents, guardians, or students’ preferred ‘trusted contact’ when a student was struggling with their mental health or exhibiting suicidal or self-harm behaviours; and
• Providing few—if any—channels of communication for parents to raise concerns about their child, and disregarding parental warnings unless the student initiated contact with the school first

As new findings reveal that student mental health problems have nearly tripled in the last year, such behaviour cannot continue. But as just 1 per cent of students surveyed agreed that their university was “very supportive” of their mental health, it is not enough for universities to simply change their behaviour: the entire framework of support needs a comprehensive overhaul.

How Institutions Can Change the Game in 2024

Evident in nearly every survey of post-secondary students across the country—even the world, in fact—are three important facts:

1. Students are not satisfied with the list of services currently available to them
2. Students do not consider current processes for locating and accessing support to be fair, appropriate, or practical—let alone helpful
3. Students do not want to go through their university for help

In light of these findings, institutions hoping to enhance support for student wellbeing in 2024 may want to explore collaborating with external partners for assistance. By teaming up with a wellbeing solutions provider, for instance, campus leaders can aspire to tackle all three of these concerns (and more) by way of access to:

1. A comprehensive list of wellbeing services that address a range of topics from emotional and physical wellbeing, to tackling burnout, adopting better lifestyle habits, financial planning for the future, improving time and stress management, and more
2. A streamlined and confidential process for accessing services, featuring multiple methods of contact for students’ comfort and convenience, including by text, phone, video, or in-person
3. Third-party, culturally competent, and professionally trained counsellors, coaches, and clinicians who can provide ongoing or one-time support to students to help them navigate challenges, identify solutions and next steps, set goals, develop healthy coping skills, and manage stress effectively—without having to disclose anything to their institution

But while these components are essential to improving support for students, they don’t even begin to tap into the myriad of ways in which wellbeing solutions providers can help to rewrite the framework for supporting students’ wellbeing.

While compile a complete list would be exhaustive, some of the crucial ways in which a wellbeing provider can revolutionize the support institutions offer to students include:

• It expands the domain of mental health. First and foremost, a wellbeing solutions provider helps to take student support to the next level by taking a holistic approach to student wellbeing. Mental health challenges don’t take place in a vacuum: especially for post-secondary students dealing with physical, psychological, financial, and social independence for the first time, there are many challenges that come with this newfound freedom that can have an adverse effect on their mental wellbeing. A great example of this comes from King’s College London’s new study on student mental health, which observes that a “significant part” of the increase in poor mental health among students perfectly aligns with the peak of the cost-of-living crisis.

By offering a comprehensive list of financial support, including professional guidance and materials on budgeting, financial fitness, debt reduction and management, financial planning, and long-term goal setting, on top of other coaching services focused on improving students’ lifestyle habits (e.g., nutrition, physical activity, time management) and emotional regulation, wellbeing providers can better address the root causes of adverse mental health outcomes among students, and better assist them in overcoming these challenges.

• It’s better equipped to tackle the most prevalent issues affecting students. In addition to financial strain, research clearly shows that loneliness and substance abuse are the two most pressing issues impacting students across the country. A recent survey from The Tab found that two-thirds of all students—and a staggering 90 per cent of students who have ever had a mental health issue—have experienced loneliness on campus. Likewise, The Tab’s research found that almost 75 per cent of students have turned to drugs or alcohol as a means of self-medicating.

Thankfully, wellbeing solutions providers have the tools to address these challenges head on. As a means of inspiring positive peer connections and capitalizing on students’ ability to help each other, many providers offer Wellbeing Ambassador Programmes (also: “Champion”) that seek to cultivate a support system from within, subsequently reducing loneliness as well as the stigma around mental health that often contributes to it. Additionally, many providers also offer tobacco cessation and other substance addiction services that can connect students with a licensed professional who can help them limit and alleviate their dependency on various substances.

• It offers round-the-clock, equitable support. As one student surveyed by the Petitions Committee aptly stated: “The systems for accessing mental health support [at university] are complex and not fit for purpose for those in crisis or suffering poor mental health. Please make it easy – a 24-hour support line. Don’t fob us off with text lines and the Samaritans line.”

And they’re right: as helpful as they can be in providing interim, complementary support, chatbots or text lines cannot supplant face-to-face, virtual, or telephonic interaction with a live person. Students, especially, need that human touch. And they can’t afford to wait around for six months to get it. As another student rightfully noted: “I was told that there was a 12-week waiting list for my university counselling. Only by having a friend push me to recontact them did I get bumped up on the list and seen. Without that friend, I may not have been there after the 12 weeks to rescue.”

By collaborating with an external wellbeing provider, institutions are able to do what 20-, 30-person counselling staff simply cannot: provide 24/7 access to a live counsellor or clinician.

Additionally, thanks to the resources that providers have available to scout and screen for a diverse range of counsellors with all different backgrounds, collaborating with a wellbeing provider can also ensure that students have access to affirming and culturally competent support. This is especially important as findings from the King’s College London study reveal that queer, trans and non-binary, female, and BIPOC students are statistically more likely to be affected by poor mental health than their white, straight, cisgender, and male peers.

• Its universality seeks to normalize asking for help. Not only does the phrase “mental health support” fail to accurately represent the wide array of wellness topics that providers can support—or adequately speak to students’ health needs—but it also contributes to the stigmatic belief that only “certain types of people” (often preceded by a host of negative attributes) need to reach out for help. “I don’t have a diagnosis, therefore I’m fine,” “I don’t have depression/anxiety, therefore I’m fine,” is what students will falsely say to themselves when they hear phrases like “mental health support.” At the same time, students who do have a diagnosed mental health issue, or who are experiencing problems like depression or anxiety, will avoid seeking the help that they need out of fear of being labelled as someone who “needs help” or is “mentally ill.”

By contrast, the phrase “wellbeing support” helps to destigmatize help-seeking by making it not only more accessible to all, but more appealing. The term “wellbeing” makes it seem more like a choice; a personal commitment or decision to improve one’s quality of life. Students don’t always have to have emotional or psychological ailments to address; they may want to call in or talk to a trained professional about how they can manage stress while in school; how they can prevent burnout; how they can adhere to a healthier diet and fitness regimen while on campus. Through the scope of services that a wellbeing provider can offer, students recognize that there is something in it for everyone, which in turn lessens the stigma on campus surrounding help-seeking, inspires word-of-mouth promotion of these services, and boosts utilization.

• Its assessments allow for better targeted support and crisis prevention. On average, more than a third of drop-outs are for mental health reasons—25 percentage points higher than any other explanation. Likewise, new research shows that almost a third of applicants (~154,000 students) will come to campus in the fall with a history of missing school due to their mental health. To target support to those students, and to prevent students from dropping out—or worse—institutions must have a better understanding of the needs and concerns of their unique student body. Assessments designed by a team of dedicated researchers can help.

By investing in a wellbeing solutions provider, campus leaders can collaborate on surveys to be distributed to their student body that address various health concerns, outcomes, topics, or trends. They can assess the prevalence of suicidality, self-harm, self-medication/substance abuse, financial insecurity, loneliness, depression, anxiety, academic stress, burnout—and all other concerns likely to affect students. Once results have been recorded, institutions receive access to an aggregated report, and even have the option to divide data by demographic to observe which cohort(s) of students are experiencing the most difficulty, in order to expedite the process of them getting the care that they need.

By understanding students’ concerns—and, more importantly, demonstrating a commitment to learning what those concerns are to begin with—leaders can not only provide better support to their students, but can improve students’ wellbeing just by proving that they’re cared for by their institution.

• It supports not just students, but institutional leaders. On a similar but sour note, the majority of students, parents, and guardians currently agree that institutional leaders are failing them. They don’t communicate, they don’t tell the truth, and they don’t seem to care. Especially when it comes to the issue of suicide, many students and their families find institutions’ responses to be wholly inadequate, if not unethical. According to The Tab’s findings, nearly 90 per cent of students wish their university was more transparent about the amount of student suicides that happen. Likewise, the majority of parents or legal guardians wish that they would be kept properly informed about their children’s welfare.

Issues like suicide or self-harm are hard topics to address. Hiding behind data protection regulations to avoid informing parents that their child has attempted suicide is, plainly, an unacceptable course of action. But so is being too forthcoming and posting about a suicide online before the parents are informed. What leaders need—especially now as some institutions observe a staggering 500 per cent increase in deaths by suicide—is crisis response training. They need to know how to deliver life-altering news. They need to know how to use sensitive language. They need to know what things to say, and what not to say. And they need to know how to listen.

With access to a myriad of leadership trainings, including on topics like leading through a crisis, delivering upsetting news, compassionate communications and active listening, responding to trauma, and more, wellbeing solutions providers can help inspire better leaders, which in turn can inspire a better campus environment, and a safer and healthier student body.

As September quickly approaches—much to everyone’s chagrin—it’s safe to say that campuses won’t be able to reinvent the wheel when it comes to revolutionising student wellbeing support in such a short period of time. But this list of important changes proves that it can be done. Institutions don’t have to act on their own. As they prepare students for the “real world,” what better example is there to set than by collaborating with community partners to achieve the same, common goal?