Be Informed
Evidence shows that being informed – continuing to increase your knowledge throughout life, can improve and maintain your mental wellbeing. It doesn’t have to mean getting more qualifications. There are lots of different ways to bring learning into your life, even during lockdown. For example, you could try something new, rediscover an old interest, take on a different responsibility at work, or develop a new skill. Set a challenge you will enjoy achieving. Learning new things will make you connect with others, be more confident, help you build a sense of purpose, set goals and celebrate achievements, as well as being fun. Find out about support and training opportunities from across the university here, or take a smaller step to improve your wellbeing now.
Small Steps…
- Browse the Staff Development Portal and find the Development and Training opportunities suitable for you
- Connect with colleagues and have a conversation about what courses they are doing/have done
- Watch a Ted Talk on something that interests you, or go to a lecture
- Have a look at the Careers page for staff and browse through the resources on Abintegro
- Find out about coaching and mentoring and go on a taster session
Mental Health Awareness eLearning programme
This programme is bespoke to Lancaster and is a mandatory training requirement for all staff.
The training aims to:
- Raise staff awareness of mental health issues
- Increase knowledge about common problems among students and staff
- Increase staff awareness and ability to recognise signs and symptoms
- Increase confidence in knowing how to respond to a student or staff member experiencing mental health challenges, including concerns relating to risk
- Increase knowledge about sources of support for students and staff
- Encourage staff to look after themselves, especially when supporting others
- Clarify boundaries when supporting students and staff
- Clarify role expectations in relation to providing mental health support.
The training includes a downloadable Emergency Situations Guide to help guide staff to sources of support for students both within University hours and out of hours. To start the programme, please visit the Mental Health Awareness Moodle page.
Support And Training Opportunities From Across The University
Specialist Support
You can also access a huge range of specialist local, national and global specialist support to help improve your wellbeing. Our Wellbeing Work Group links up with organisations to highlight additional support that staff can access. Please see our Specialist Support page for more details and get in touch with the Wellbeing Workgroup if you have more to add.
You can also be referred to Occupational Health by your line manager.
Five Ways to Wellbeing
Find out about the other pathways to wellbeing below to improve your wellbeing:
