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St. John’s Ambulance Webinar - World Mental Health Day
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On 12th October, to recognise World Mental Health Week, our anti-bullying ambassadors attended the World Mental Health Day webinar hosted by St John’s Ambulance.
They listened to professionals talking about the impact of loneliness, poverty, confidence and hope on an individual’s mental health. They discussed how bullying impacts mental health and how they can use their role as anti-bullying ambassadors to develop a safety culture, including helping other students to develop psychological safety and the confidence to speak out.
We discussed as a group how leaders, including student leaders, can support people to develop and maintain good mental health. We discussed the links between physical health and mental health and how networks within our school community can support people who are feeling alone or isolated. The students identified places of psychological safety and how they could use these to support students who may come to them.
We discussed how we ensure as a school community we support everyone to feel they belong and are welcome; we ensure everyone is represented, respected and supported and this allows us to be a thriving and resilient community.
The students considered where and when in school students may feel pressure (peer pressure, exam pressure, mental pressure) and how this can help them to perform but also how they can look out for when this turns into stress. We looked at how we can identify this within ourselves and others and to use the anti-bullying ambassador role to refer students for additional support.
Students have said:
- DH: I think the webinar was helpful as I know more ways people can feel bullied and more ways I can help.
- TP: The webinar was really eye opening and I think it helped me with how to be a better anti-bullying ambassador.
- EP: I have learned that people need to learn how to open up. It helped me, in a way, for myself to open up in order to encourage others to open up to me.
- FA: It showed us that mental health is not always seen with the naked eye. It raised my awareness that anyone can be suffering from poor mental health.
- DW: I thought the webinar was educational and taught a lot about mental health.
The students were very mature and considered in their responses to the professionals’ prompts and questions and I was very proud to have participated in the webinar with them. Well done to the anti-bullying ambassadors.
Mrs Lotay
