Amity teachers learn about student mental health issues
 

Amity teachers seem to be noticing a rise in mental health issues on campus, or at least a new awareness of the challenges that exist.  At the Amity teacher conference in Nanjing, Amity teacher Karen Gabe, who teaches psychology at Nanjing University, led a session in which experts, Amity staff, a seminary student who works with university students and Amity teachers explored some of the roots of the issues, traditional Chinese attitudes toward mental problems and people that face them, resources that might be available and appropriate responses for Amity teachers.

Students in China face an immense amount of pressure.  First they have to perform very well in primary school to get into the better junior middle schools (for 7^th – 9^th grades).  After that, they have to do very well in junior middle school and pass entrance examinations to earn the opportunity to go on to senior middle school (for 10^th -12^th grades).  If they want to go on to college or university, they must do very well in senior middle school and pass a very stiff university entrance examination.  Although the number of places offered by colleges and universities has been increasing at a rapid rate, the competition is extremely stiff and many youth find themselves deeply disappointed by their failure to score higher enough to earn a place in higher education.  Even those who have “passed” the university entrance examination feel like total failures because their scores were not high enough to enter the most prestigious universities.  That latter, is often true of the students that we Amity teachers have in our classes in the smaller teachers colleges. 

In addition, students face a great deal of pressure to uphold the honor of their family through their success—the success of getting into a university or college, the success of doing well in that university or college, and the success of landing a good job when they graduate.  To fall down at any stage of this process is to bring same not just on oneself, but also on one’s whole family.  For young people from poorer families, the whole extended family has often made sacrificial financial contributions to make it possible for them to go to college.  The pressure for them to do well is, thus, magnified.  For young people from poorer rural families, they may be the first person from their village to be able to go for higher education.  That circle of financial support and of extremely high expectations for young people gets magnified even more as the hope of the whole village rests on their shoulders. 

The worry about finding a job is very real for every college and university student in China today.  Many graduates have their dreams crushed by not being able to get a job.  I know that recently one organization advertised that it would be interviewing for 10 entry level positions and had 500 applicants.  This is wonderful for any organization wanting to hire the cream of the crop, but what about the other 490 young people and their future.  It is very difficult.

Traditional prejudices against those with mental illness or mental problems of any kind are hard to break.  Often the person him or herself is blamed for their own problems.  Often they are shunned by others because to associate with someone with this kind of problem also tends to brand friends and relatives as well.  Individuals, families and friends may then just want to hide the problems rather than to encourage the open seeking of help.  So, although some, at least minimal counseling services are available on many campuses, students may not be so willing to seek help.  I once remember a leader who provided a lot of helpful support to a student who had been suicidal, counseling that student when she was released from the hospital not to tell anyone in her hometown about her problem, not to tell anyone in the future about her problem, and just to be sure to take her medicine regularly so that she could get a job and lead a normal life. 

In this session, Amity teachers also learned about the value of being a listening ear where students share problems with them and ways to take some of the high competitiveness out of their own classrooms.  They also gained some insights into when and how to direct the student to resources available if needed and into when and who to tell if the situation seemed to put the student or anyone else in danger.