Presentation session 2

Reaching out beyond the School

Facilitated by: Eleanor Mitchell, Bairnsdale

Rm G.01

Zoom link Presentation Session 2

Health Career Promotion in our rural areas incorporates a multi-faceted multi-organisational approach, in order to contribute to this effort we have established both the MMAD and Med-toring Programs to assist local secondary school students in promoting, provoking interest, inspiring, and reassuring that a career in health and uptaking positions at university is both possible and achievable. These programs as well as providing not only clinical hands on workshops relevant to medicine, nursing and a range of allied health disciplines (because team work makes the dream work as we know workforce shortages are across the whole span of health professionals). The participants are also provided with a range of workshops and guest speakers to help understand what assistance and support is available to realise that their ambitions are achievable. We’re delighted and proud to note some participants of this program have started achieving their dreams.

1. Secondary School Student Program

Jenny Timmis & Louise Hodgetts - Mildura

2. Allied Health Service-learning in Rural Victoria

Pam Harvey - RNAH, Bendigo

In Australia, service-learning is a form of workplace integrated learning (WIL) not confined to health profession courses. The definition of service-learning varies, but is generally understood as a ‘course-based, credit-bearing, educational experience’ that meets community needs as well as involving reflective learning. Service-learning differs from usual clinical placements because of the reciprocity and mutuality of experience with the host site. Examples of service-learning placements in Victoria include the work of the Sunraysia Collaboration in primary schools, and the University of Melbourne Rural Health Department’s placements in aged care, mental health and primary schools. This presentation describes service-learning and community engagement, with an emphasis on allied health students.

Julia Choate, Physiology

3. Collaborations to support Mental health and wellbeing

Globally there has been an increase in mental health issues for university students (Hernández-Torrano et al., 2020). Educators are guaranteed points of contact for students with mental health issues, and these student-educator relationship influence students’ experiences of higher education (Felten &Lambert, 2020). However, little is known about the effects of these relationships and interactions on educators, particularly how they modify their teaching practices over time to support these students. This study used interpretive phenomenological methodology (Larkin et al., 2006) to explore how educators experience students with mental health issues, particularly how they adapt their teaching practices to mitigate both the stress on students and the impacts of these interactions on themselves. Seventeen educators from a variety of disciplines at an Australian or Canadian university participated in a series of semi-structured interviews. Interview transcripts were thematically analysed (Braun & Clark, 2006). Educators predominantly encountered students in distress around course assessments (e.g. requests for extensions, missed assignments, office visits). They saw their role in these interactions as normalising struggles, listening, and guiding students to support. Interactions with students in distress had personal impacts (loss of time and sleep, self-doubt) and professional impacts (changes in teaching practices or career). Educators reported modifications to their teaching practices, some of which were intentional and some subtle changes that upon reflection were noted to have benefitted wellbeing. The themes of these modifications centred around intentionally designing a ‘wellness curriculum’ and included concepts such as flexible assessment structure, regular check-ins with students, role modelling of imperfection, and normalization of mental health issues. When thinking of mitigating strategies for themselves, educators highlighted the importance of relational support, compartmentalization, boundaries, and the need for mental health training. This study highlights transformative curricular modifications and personal mitigating strategies that support student and educator wellbeing.

Recording of presentation session 2

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