Stress and Mental Health in Chemistry Graduate Education

Abstract

A key challenge for any graduate program is to address stress and mental health without lowering the bar for the degree. In our department, we have focused on eliminating unnecessary sources of stress. We, that means not just the departmental leadership, but graduate students, the director of graduate studies, mental health advocates, and professionals from the university health services. Only professionals can provide therapy, but the whole community can contribute to help prevent problems before they arise and to recognize and direct students in distress to appropriate resources. In particular, the student group Community of Chemistry Graduate Students (CCGS) is taking a key role in organizing regular events on physical and mental health and stress management. For example, their videos on the topics of mental health in graduate school, academic success, and the transition into a job after graduate school have attracted much attention. A very important tool to help us in our efforts is a biannual survey specifically designed together with the university health services to assess the sources of stress. This talk will address some of the new insights we have gained from analyzing the results of these surveys. (1) Stress and mental health in graduate school: How student empowerment creates lasting change, Mousavi, M. P. S.; Sohrabpour, Z.; Anderson, E. L.; Stemig-Vindedahl, A.; Golden, D.; Christenson, G.; Lust, K.; Bühlmann, P. J. Chem. Ed. 2018 , 95, 1939–1946. (2) http://ccgs.chem.umn.edu/surviving-and-thriving-higher-education