Undergraduate mental health issues: the challenge of the second year of study

Background: Student mental health is a global issue. Macaskill (2012) reported that the second year was associated with the most significant increases in psychiatric symptoms in UK students. Qualitative data were collected to explore this further. Method: Twenty-three second year undergraduate students were interviewed using a narrative interviewing method to explore their experience of their second year of study. They also completed the GHQ-28. Students were grouped according to their psychiatric caseness scores, giving two groups, a well group with scores ≤ 5 and a clinical case group with scores ≥6 and their interview data were compared. Results: Using thematic analysis, various themes and subthemes were identified. While both groups identified the same issues namely, the first year concerns impacting on the second year, course issues, careers and future employability and student debt, the groups reported very different coping styles. Conclusion: There were shared anxieties across both groups. The majority related to institutional practices and the unintended impact they may be having on student mental health. While specialist interventions would help the clinical caseness group, arguably the anxiety levels of both groups would benefit equally from relatively easy to implement, inexpensive institutional changes and/or additions to current practices in universities

Engaging and Empowering Business Management Students to Support the Mitigation of Climate Change Through Sustainability Auditing

In spite of growth in specialist courses and modules, and integration of some sustainability content into business management curricula, engaging business management students in sustainable business practices continues to lag behind needs of graduates in the workplace; most students do not understand the role businesses can play in supporting the mitigation of climate change and alleviation of impacts. As the learning environment is an important determinant of behaviour, new means and methods of learning, teaching and assessment are required to enhance education for sustainability for business management students to improve their knowledge of climate change mitigation, adaption and impact reduction and empower future graduate employees to change businesses from within. In response, an innovative learning, teaching and assessment approach has been designed for a 3rd year undergraduate module to equip business management students with sustainability knowledge and tools to develop and communicate climate change mitigation activities through the completion of a Global Reporting Initiative sustainability audit of a bespoke case study company. This conceptual paper presents the means and methods employed in this innovative module. It describes the theoretical and practical contexts of the module, its experiential learning, teaching and assessment means and methods designed for active, collaborative learning and outlines the opportunities and challenges experienced in designing the module. It will help members of the sustainability community seeking to build new means and methods of generative education for sustainability through active, experiential learning. It builds on existing pedagogic discourse on innovative means and methods for learning, teaching and assessment of opportunities for sustainable business futures and climate change mitigation and contributes to research into participatory approaches to education for sustainability