Looking After Yourself
To support you, the University offers an Employee Assistance Programme ran by Validium, a specialist external provider of staff wellbeing and mental health services. You find more information about their services and how to self-refer here.
A number of our workshops are available to staff members. Please see our workshops here.
Supporting Students
As a staff member, there are times where you may have concerns about a student's mental health and wellbeing. In addition to signposting them to the Counselling & Mental Health Service, there a number of resources and support services available that you can direct them to. These can be found on the Student Support website. Please also refer to this guidance: Worried about someone? (The University of Manchester)
Students can also self refer to Health Assured, who offer 24 hour telephone support from trained counsellors and other advisors. Students can also use the My Health Advantage app to speak to a counsellor via live chat, as well as using interactive resources to help track and improve their wellbeing. Although Health Assured is primarily a self referral service, staff can refer students here for a call back if they feel this may be helpful. Please note that a student does have to be agreeable to this. This may be particularly useful if you are trying to link a student with some support out of hours/over weekend.
Online resources
The University has developed online training to help staff to support students. The first resource is aimed at all staff who are in contact with students as part of their work, it will help you to support students’ wellbeing from the initial point of contact with a student in need Supporting Students at The University of Manchester.
This new online training course looks at the Six Ways to Wellbeing and how we can support students to proactively take care of their wellbeing.
If you have significant concerns about the mental health of a student this crisis pathway can provide guidance about next steps.
Training for PGR Supervisors
Two online modules, originally developed by the University of Durham have been adapted for supervisors at the University of Manchester:
Supporting PGR Mental Health and Wellbeing for PGR Supervisors provides an overview of mental health in the context of postgraduate ressearch. The course offers supervisors guidance on how they can identify, respond to and support postgraduate researchers in distress.
Case Studies for PGR Supervision in the Context of Mental Health Difficulties explore the process of supervision of postgraduate researchers when supervisees are having difficulties.
Face to Face & zoom
In addition to the online resources above we also provide regular training sessions for staff:
Student Mental Health Matters: spotting the signs, knowing what to say and knowing what to do
Sessions are delivered either in-person (10am to 1pm) or via Zoom (11am to 1pm)
Further information and booking can be found via the staff training catalogue.
Advice and consultancy
We provide telephone advice and consultancy for tutors and others who would like to talk through their involvement in helping someone else. Such advice is confidential and may provide a second opinion on help or guidance being provided to a third party.