In a world where rest feels like laziness and hustle culture is glorified, mental health is at an all-time low
By: Nada Bouchalkha, Opinion Contributor
When was the last time you felt that wave of unforgiving guilt for taking a lazy day? Maybe it crept in after skipping your workout or missing a lecture you knew wasn’t going to hold your attention.
That relentless voice urging you to do more, achieve more and be more - we all know it too well. But here’s the truth: that internalized voice has a name - hustle culture. Recognizing it is the first step toward taking back control.
Everyone’s relationship with hustle culture is different. But if any of this sounds familiar, it might be time to let go of its hold.
The mantra that "the grind never stops" becomes so deeply embedded in our thinking that we begin punishing ourselves, by depriving ourselves of sleep or denying ourselves leisure activities and forcing us to cancel plans or abandon hobbies. This misplaced sense of guilt often leads to deteriorating mental health, burnout, exhaustion and even physical illness brought on by stress.
The constant need to keep up, coupled with the fear of falling behind, can feel exhausting. But life isn’t a race and sometimes, slowing down is more beneficial than you think.
At university, an environment where success is measured primarily by your GPA and busyness, it’s easy to feel like taking time for yourself is a sign of weakness. Social media reinforces this pressure, saturating us with carefully curated videos of high achievers that highlight only their best days. The constant need to keep up, coupled with the fear of falling behind, can feel exhausting. But life isn’t a race and sometimes slowing down is more beneficial than you think.
This toxic cycle traps us in a state of perpetual dissatisfaction. It becomes near impossible to appreciate the little things in life when you’re constantly operating in survival mode. True satisfaction cannot be achieved when success is endlessly redefined around productivity because it leaves no room for self-acceptance.
Whether this resonates with you as a student taking on too many courses or as someone juggling multiple jobs at once, the question remains: if being productive comes at the expense of your mental health, is it really worth it?
Allowing yourself to rest is the first step towards balance and learning what healthy productivity looks like.
Healthy productivity is about achieving a balance between work and well-being. As a student, this means setting realistic goals and allowing yourself to slow down. After all, every step forward, no matter how little, will contribute to your growth.
It is important to grant yourself compassion for the days that you don’t meet the high standards you set. By nurturing both your personal and professional development, you can not only achieve success but also grow as an individual.
There is a unique tranquility in allowing yourself to embrace the little things like napping, spending time with friends, going on a walk, or even doing nothing at all.
It’s essential to discover your sense of purpose beyond merely material achievements and productivity-driven goals. There is a unique tranquility in allowing yourself to embrace the little things like napping, spending time with friends, going on a walk, or even doing nothing at all.
It has be said that the most successful animals are those that are the laziest. Even in nature, survival often depends on conserving energy rather than constantly expending it. Similarly, the constant chase of productivity without rest can leave us burnt out, detached from our goals, disconnected and unfulfilled.
You should feel a sense of pride not only during your "hustle" but also in your moments doing nothing at all. Though doing nothing may seem easy, social pressures can make it feel surprisingly difficult, especially for students who are endlessly pressured to prioritize grades and build a “perfect” resume.
Embracing downtime and investing in leisure activities that restore us are not signs of laziness or weakness. Rather, they sustain our mental health and make us more productive in the long run.
So, this isn’t to say you should drop everything and become a surfer, unless of course that is your true calling. But if being "lazy" means taking care of yourself, then by all means do so.
Although we all strive to do well on our midterms this should not occur at the expense of our physical and mental well-being
With exam season fast approaching, many students are slowly starting to forget about their own well-being. All-nighters, avoiding breaks and skipping meals will be the daily norm as libraries are filled to the brim with students focused on achieving one goal - getting a good grade.
Under the pressure of succeeding in rigorous university classes, students are forced to prioritize their GPAs above everything – but at what cost?
Under no circumstances is it okay to place your academics above your mental well-being, especially during high-stress periods like exam season. In fact, during times like these, it’s important to prioritize yourself to avoid psychological distress.
Under no circumstances is it okay to place your academics above your mental well-being, especially during high-stress periods like exam season. In fact, during times like these, it’s important to prioritize yourself to avoid psychological distress.
You should not be pushing through deteriorating mental health for the sake of an exam. By doing so, students are making themselves susceptible to psychological distress, academic burnout, and isolation from the damaged relationships. Indulging in these typical exam activities infrequently may be okay for the time being. However, when consistently making these activities common practice many long-term adverse health implications accompany that.
For example, you may have skipped lunch today because you have an exam at 4 p.m. You may think that using this extra time to study might help you do better on your exam than if you were to grab lunch.
In the short term, you are now starving during your exam which may distract you and make it difficult to concentrate on the exam. However, if you continue to skip meals you are putting yourself at risk for health issues such as mood swings and brain fog. Over time, more concerning consequences can arise too, like fainting and muscle loss, contributing to more illnesses that can cause you a trip to the emergency room.
Experiencing these extreme health implications will only worsen over time if students continue to study all night and isolate themselves from friends and family.
Even though exam season is riddled with anxiety and stress, it is important to understand that the habits we develop during these academically critical periods will have long-term negative impacts on our health. When our health is impacted, our performance on exams is also negatively impacted.
So, what really are the benefits of neglecting our wellbeing?
Although skipping study breaks may help you perform well on your first exam, it’s very likely that continuing these habits will prevent you from performing well on future exams. Additionally, you may begin to experience insomnia, psychological distress, and increased stress levels. Overall, these short-term practices not only have negative health implications in the long term, but they also impact your performance on exams as December progresses.
As hard as it may be, students should not sacrifice their well-being temporarily for exams as the consequences follow us well after. We must recognize that regardless of the intentions for indulging in these practices, there are very minimal benefits to experience during exam season.
We must recognize that regardless of the intentions for indulging in these practices, there are very minimal benefits to experience during exam season.
In fact, prioritizing our well-being can demonstrate academic benefits that will allow us to excel during exams. For example, eating nourishing meals throughout this stressful period can increase mental alertness and stabilize your energy levels allowing you to perform better on exams.
With exams quickly approaching, it's important to remember that sacrificing your well-being to upkeep an ideal GPA can lead to unhealthy habits appearing in the long-term concerns. Taking care of your health, such as eating well and taking breaks.
Despite the pressure to take an "all-in" approach during our university years, minimizing overwork can actually yield maximum rewards in the long run
By Ardena Bašić, Opinion contributor
When you start university, everything seems a lot more challenging. Your high school teachers constantly warned about how strict professors would be, your peers spread the word about how difficult the courses are and the whole transition to this new stage of life feels incredibly intimidating.
With the fear of failure during this rather stressful point in their lives, what many first-year students turn to is an "all-in" approach. This approach could include of studying 24/7, never saying no to a party or social event due to fear of missing out, feeling the need to make friends with everyone and overall pressuring ourselves to put 100 per cent effort into all endeavours, all the time.
While this "all-in" approach seems logical in a world that tells us that hard work pays off, our success is not always guaranteed.
I personally focused all my energy on studying not only in just my first year but also in my second. This decision was motivated by the aforementioned factors of new beginnings and arduous challenges and my personal goals. As someone who desired a job in high finance or law — requiring grad school and the associated stellar achievements — I thought that any distractions or activities taken away from school and work would be impeding.
Very soon, however, the consequences of this approach become clear to me.
For one, you miss out on learning opportunities outside of your books. University is a time when we are exposed to new people, ideas and perspectives that can shape the way we think going forward; when we're trapped in the library all day, we fail to appreciate this and to build integral skills like social and emotional intelligence. As such, this "all-in" approach can limit our personal growth and development.
Secondly, we forget the importance of balance. I do not believe we are ever in a state of perfect equilibrium, but rather in a constant flow with different focuses at different points in our lives. However, making time to go for walks, read books for pleasure and not just to fill our brains, going to events and exploring Hamilton are pivotal to ensuring we are well-rounded individuals, experiencing all colours of the life we are meant to live.
Lastly, burnout, anxiety and stress are real — especially for students; the all-in approach only accelerates this fatigue and distress. Being too focused on achievement, as opposed to living, can cause us to resent the purpose of our hard work in the first place. Once this happens, it is easy to lose motivation and set yourself back, destroying the efforts of your focus and ambition.
With time and experience, I have come to embrace the "less is more" approach. You know yourself best and know how much you need to study for certain subjects and work to maintain a healthy, balanced lifestyle. Taking some time to reflect on your priorities can help you figure out how much time you need to spend in different areas of your life and how to allocate it accordingly.
Once I decided to spend my weekends with friends, breaks between classes at coffee shops and mornings at the gym, I felt clearer, healthier and more motivated to achieve my goals. Of course, there will be times when you must divert your energy elsewhere, like during exam season, but I believe that being flexible in your approach is the key to success in your dynamic university years and well beyond.
C/O Vitolda Klein, Unsplash
Chasing perfection is a societal ideal that rarely benefits the one chasing
Recently, I have noticed how often the term "perfectionism" is thrown around. Nowadays, it seems as if everyone is a proud perfectionist who refuses to accept any standard short of perfection.
Their sense of perfectionism will appear in their work ethic, study habits and even personal relationships. In spite of the rise of perfectionism in the last decade, I have had a difficult time understanding the glorification of this phenomenon.
To be clear, I don’t believe that individuals willingly fall into the trap of perfectionism. It's often society that pushes us towards perfectionist behaviours as we are incessantly told from a young age to improve and polish every aspect of our life that might be slightly blemished.
From our parents to our schools, to our mentors, we are told how the “real world” holds high standards that we have to live up to. Time after time, we have been told how achieving greatness stems from perfect work ethics, perfect grades and a perfect attitude.
Because of these harsh statements, many of us have been conditioned to only judge ourselves and our accomplishments on a zero to perfect scale — meaning if our work is not performed perfectly, it might as well deserve a zero.
For example, we often don’t feel proud if we score a 90% since our immediate thought is how we could have potentially achieved a 100%, but failed to do so. We slowly start losing happiness and joy because accomplishments are no longer satisfying if they are not “perfect.”
In fact, over 60% of McMaster students reported feeling higher than average levels of stress in a 2017 survey, leading to concerns about the effects of chronic stress in university students.
In fact, over 60% of McMaster students reported feeling higher than average levels of stress in a 2017 survey, leading to concerns about the effects of chronic stress in university students.
KIMIA TAHAEI, OPINIONS STAFF WRITER
However, I must say that I don’t believe that perfectionism is entirely devoid of value. In fact, science has proven that “healthy perfectionism” exists. Studies have stated how in some cases perfectionism can often be a driving source to perform your absolute best and achieve the highest of accomplishments.
However, I must question, how thin is the line between “healthy perfectionism” and obsessive perfectionism? Can individuals who fall into the trap of perfectionism in their work life keep it detached from their personal lives? Wouldn’t relationships, hobbies and activities done for the sheer joy of it deteriorate if perfection is the only given option?
“The most evil trick about perfectionism is that it disguises itself as a virtue,” stated author Rebecca Solnit.
“The most evil trick about perfectionism is that it disguises itself as a virtue,” stated author Rebecca Solnit.
KIMIA TAHAEI, OPINIONS STAFF WRITER
This quote excellently explains why so many individuals fall into the trap of perfectionism. They do so as they believe that this could increase their quality of work and they could reach perfection. However, the unfortunate truth is that the concept of anything ‘perfect’ is erroneous. Often, because individuals cannot define ‘perfect’, they assume they aren't reaching it, making perfectionism a never-ending cycle.
Candidly, we must take a step and ask ourselves, how are we defining a ‘perfect job’ or a ‘perfect relationship’? Or whether a ‘perfect grade’ is truly worth it, if it comes at the cost of our mental health?
We cannot let the false and outdated definition of perfectionism gain control over our decisions. In a world that is so cruel and chaotic at times, it’s foolish to rob ourselves from experiencing the simple joys of life.
In an isolating pandemic, music serves as a crucial way for us to cope
By: Jesica Martinez de Hoz, Contributor
The arts are repeatedly seen as non-essential. Yet, as COVID-19 has heightened issues in our economic, social and political structures, we look to music not only as a distraction from the outside world but as a means of connection.
Though it may seem like more than a lifetime ago, if you think back to March of this year you might remember the viral story about people all over Italy stepping out onto their balconies and joining together in song. After being restricted to their homes due to a country-wide lockdown, many Italians chose to use music as a way to keep their spirits up and stay in touch throughout an extremely distressing time.
A lot of musicians, rather than singing from the rooftops, have been using this time indoors to concentrate on making music. While some artists, like Taylor Swift, were able to write, record and make music videos for an entire album during the pandemic, others have had to come up with innovative ideas on how to collaborate and continue creating. Yet, regardless of any new struggles they have to face, the pandemic has not stopped musicians from making music.
Thank goodness for that. While this was happening across the globe, many Canadian students, including myself, were finishing up the winter 2020 semester online. Now, more than ever, do we need music to help us get by. Just as musicians use their songs as a way to express themselves, we listen to them in order to brighten our mood, better understand our own emotions or simply escape. Whether it was used to pass the time or as a diversion from current events, the amount of media consumed rapidly increased.
Music has helped me cope with the events of the last couple of months through a radio show which I host on CFMU, McMaster University’s community radio station. In being able to produce a new show every week, I’m given a creative outlet to share my thoughts, as well as the chance to promote the artists who have helped me de-stress while being stuck inside.
In being able to produce a new show every week, I’m given a creative outlet to share my thoughts, as well as the chance to promote the artists who have helped me de-stress while being stuck inside.
At first, it was difficult to transition from recording live at the station, to trying to figure out how to use GarageBand all by myself. However, like many musicians, in forcing me to adapt, this pandemic has provided me with the opportunity and incentive to learn a new skill that I would have never otherwise attempted.
With several of CFMU’s hosts also taking steps to record their shows from home, the station has continued to act as a bridge between the McMaster and Hamilton communities during this period of isolation. Locally and globally, radio is helping musicians remain connected with their fans and listeners stay connected within their communities, showing yet another one of the music’s many influences.
We often take for granted how substantial music is in our daily lives, even before COVID-19. Yet, whether it's an outlet for us to be creative and express ourselves, a diversion from stressful current events or a way to feel connected, music has been an essential way for many to manage in this pandemic.
The mental illness label can have tremendous impacts and we should approach it with more care
By: Frank Chen, Contributor
CW: mentions of mental illness
Veterans of university know: this late-November to mid-December stretch is not a good time of the year. As midterms wrap up and exam season ramps into full gear, this is the point where students become overwhelmed, burnt out and exhausted. Yet, we have some of the most important examinations ahead. Especially in this “unprecedented” year, the burden on students is massive, and the McMaster University community has been vocal about it.
At the forefront of this is a discussion regarding student mental health. Over the past year, the ideas of mental health and mental illness have been thrown around a lot by students. Students are increasingly expressing loneliness, reporting frustration with coursework and burning out. As a result of those feelings, I’ve seen more and more people labelling themselves as depressed or anxious. But “mental illness” is a term with a lot more weight than many people realize.
When the “mental illness” tag is put on you, it’s often seen as a fixed state — a never-ending onslaught of “bad” mental health. It becomes easy to stop appreciating the good parts of your life when you fixate on the idea that you are “mentally unfit.” Regardless of illness or not, there can be real harm done just by the label itself.
As an example, in my first year of university (which was in person), I bought into the idea that my stresses and insecurities were a form of generalized anxiety disorder. Due to this, I put boundaries on how I could or could not act based on what I thought of my own mental state. This took away so many possibilities.
Instead, I now realize how my stresses in my first year could be reframed as a normal response to a change of environment and an adaptation to university life. But regardless, my belief of having anxiety limited me and it can be incredibly easy to misjudge these negative emotions to mental illness.
Both my personal experience and some of the nuances in how students talk about mental illness illustrate an important idea: that our view of mental illness can be incredibly individualized. In stressful situations that evoke emotional responses and actions, we often miscategorize our failings to ourselves rather than a product of our environment.
For example, students often blame themselves for their grades, for not being prepared enough or for not being that star student who can simultaneously juggle many commitments. However, what we fail to consider are the social contexts that we are in that often make it difficult to achieve these standards, such as home conditions, family duties or socioeconomic status.
In stressful situations that evoke emotional responses and actions, we often miscategorize our failings to ourselves rather than a product of our environment.
Similarly, students also often talk about mental health as a dichotomous issue, as either having good or bad mental health, which inherently puts pressure on themselves to “fix” their mental states. But realistically, everyone has good and bad days, largely influenced by the events and activities taking place that day. Mental health is less a fixed state based on your own failures, but rather something that is constantly fluctuating largely influenced by your surroundings.
Our individualized view of mental illness poses danger for those caught up in it. Mental health when approached from the view that it’s the fault of the individual can often lead to a vicious cycle where mental illness can lead to self-doubt and self-hate, furthering negative self-perceptions. The label of illness can be hard to escape from, but social context is key when approaching the way you feel. Understanding that the vast majority of signs and symptoms of what you may think is illness can actually come as normal responses to stressful contexts.
It can be hard to step back and convince yourself that social contexts can play the role it does. Historically, mental health as a discipline has been rooted in individualism, harkening back to the days when disabled people, 2SLGBTQIA+ folks and others who were deemed socially undesirable were blamed for their “mental illness.”
Mental illness was used as a tool to control those who didn’t conform to social standards set at the time, their purpose was originally to condemn the individual. In part, it’s this long-standing history of individualized mental illness that contributes to why so many people still think of it this way today.
With the impending exam season, we need to be more aware of the implications of a term like “mental illness.” As we move into a stressful time for students and educators alike, I hope that we can all consider whether those negative thoughts and emotions are truly arising from mental illness or something else — because it can be very easy to misattribute feelings as disease, when there can be bigger and broader social contexts in play.
A flexible approach to university might save you and your sanity
By: Zara Khan, Contributor
Picture the ideal student. They somehow find the time to volunteer and hit the gym while they maintain their perfect grade point average. They finish their assignments far in advance and probably already studied for that midterm. You envy them and their perfectly curated bullet journal. They are a perfect model of human efficiency.
At the same time, there you are. Catching up on those missed lectures of yours, all while you have two essays due tomorrow and a midterm right after. There you are, going to sleep at 7 a.m., following a Red Bull-fueled study session with a brain that’s turned to mush. Okay, maybe it’s just me.
But if you are anything like me, you most definitely are haunted by a chronic sense of failure. You might feel as if you’re not doing what you should be doing. That you should have figured things out by now. That you should learn a certain way and aim to achieve certain things. In many ways, you feel like you simply do not measure up to that ideal student.
However, our societal notions of what makes a successful student are deeply unrealistic. Who has the time to perfectly colour code their notes? Who really manages to get everything done ahead of time? Most university students have never had to learn how to learn properly until now, so of course, we’re going to struggle.
We seem to imagine the ideal student as someone possessing inhuman amounts of energy. Someone who seems to be perfectly put together, studies for hours on end and finishes assignments far in advance. The fact that many of us seem to think that there is only one way to be a good student is concerning. So when many of us find ourselves struggling to measure up to that ideal, we seem to view it as personal failing more than anything else.
The fact that many of us seem to think that there is only one way to be a good student is concerning. So when many of us find ourselves struggling to measure up to that ideal, we seem to view it as personal failing more than anything else.
I’m not the ideal student. But what I find interesting is the fact that I’ve found more success as one that is not. In fact, I don’t take any notes during most of my lectures. Why? I’ve found that I actually retain the information better when I’m purely focused on listening. Instead, I might take notes that I need, prior to, or after class.
For the longest time, I tried to force myself to take notes during class, because that was how things should be done. What often resulted was a notebook full of the best doodles ever drawn, with absolutely zero recollection of what was actually taught. Not taking notes meant that I had more of an incentive to listen. But more importantly, it reduced the stress I often felt while trying to take good notes. Not only did I learn more, but I also saved a bit of my sanity.
Now, I’m not advocating for you to eschew note-taking during lectures. Although, what I am advocating for is a flexible approach to education. For example, students believe that they should take a full course load which is about five courses for most programs. But what if you find yourself consistently stressed by a full course load?
Day after day, you find yourself struggling to handle the workload. The obvious solution is to decrease your course load. It might be slightly unconventional and it might take longer for you to finish your degree, but it might be a beneficial alternative to you. If the conventional path to a degree doesn’t fit your needs, you should look for alternatives.
In my case, I actually took this semester off. I didn’t exactly have a fun time last winter semester, online learning quite literally sucked out the joy of learning for me. Rather than forcing myself to learn in a way that simply doesn’t work for me (which would have likely dropped my GPA), I opted to take a break instead.
This confused a few people in my life. They simply couldn’t understand why I would choose to “fall behind.” A younger friend of mine was very surprised by the fact that I could take a semester off at all. She didn’t know that it was even an option.
Surprisingly, university can be quite flexible in many ways, yet few of us take advantage of this. Many of us seem to think that there is only a four- or five-year path to a degree. In reality, you can take as long as you like or as little as you like. In short, you can plan your education in a way that works for you.
This point doesn’t only apply to the length of your degree, it can apply to any aspect of your education. I’ll admit that I often pick between either going to the lectures or doing the readings if I find that the content overlaps. I’ll often ignore recommended guidelines for an essay if I feel like they are hindering the quality of my work (though I’ll check with my professors to be safe). My strategies are unconventional, but they work for me.
I don’t know if it’s just me, but I feel that sometimes I’m more distressed by the fact that I am not doing things as I should be, rather than being stressed by school itself. A constant nagging feeling tells me that I’m not doing what I’m supposed to be. That I’m doing something wrong by refusing to conform to those expectations.
Yet, despite all the inner angst about the whole thing, I’ve found that the most liberating thing I’ve done for myself is to completely ignore these societal expectations. Ignoring them has allowed me to figure out how I can make things work for me.
I don’t know if it’s just me, but I feel that sometimes I’m more distressed by the fact that I am not doing things as I should be, rather than being stressed by school itself.
Not all strategies work for all people. The fact that many of us try to force ourselves into a narrow mould of productivity is quite counterproductive. If you, like me, find yourself struggling to learn the way you should, do yourself a favour: forget about how you should be doing things. Find out how you would do them instead.
An extended break sounds great, but it has consequences for students
On Nov. 19, McMaster University announced that our winter semester classes will begin on Jan. 11, 2021, as opposed to Jan. 4, when they were initially supposed to begin. This change was recommended by the virtual learning task force, which consists of 31 faculty, students and staff members.
They stated that the reason for this is to support students’ wellness and mental health and providing faculty and instructors with extra time in preparing for the winter term. Mac also mentions that with this extra week, students who went home will now have an extra week to self-isolate to limit COVID-19 cases.
While I am thankful for an extra week in many aspects, I think it’s important to consider the consequences of this decision.
For example, not all students will be able to enjoy this extended break. Health sciences students, with the exception of the Bachelor of Health Sciences program, are exempt from this break. This means that nursing, midwifery, physiotherapy, occupational therapy, physician assistant, medical students and more are unable to partake in the break, even if they really need it. In addition, graduate students who have planned their thesis defence for the week of Jan. 4 will not have the option to have this break.
Not only does this break already exclude a large group of students, but it may have consequences on our exam period. It’s important to note that the McMaster Daily News article states that classes will be extended into the exam period, that no classes will overlap with exams and that the semester will end as originally planned.
What this means is unclear, but we may no longer have a short break between classes and before exams. An extra week of winter break may also mean that our exam schedule is condensed, which can result in more back-to-back exams.
For me, these potential consequences of an extended winter break seem like a net negative. An extra week off is always good to have, but I’d rather have a break right before exams when I’m a lot more stressed and have my exams spread over a longer period of time.
What this means is unclear, but we may no longer have a short break between classes and before exams. An extra week of winter break may also mean that our exam schedule is condensed, which can result in more back-to-back exams.
Furthermore, if this is the response to added stress from a pandemic, their solution is weak. Other universities, such as the University of Toronto, made a much clearer statement about the reasoning behind the break and also stated that they are continuing to redesign its mental health services.
They also mention that employees who are returning on Jan. 4 will get three extra paid days off which can be used now until Aug. 31, 2021. U of T acknowledged the consequences of the pandemic by noting that students have been feeling a huge amount of stress for several months and that many U of T community members have dealt with unique challenges, such as at-home childcare.
Obviously, U of T has its own set of issues that have yet to be addressed, but it is comforting to know that they have other action items that they are working on to improve the quality of life for students.
Most of all, this announcement had me frustrated. I’m worried that because students seem happy about this break — which we’re allowed to be happy about — Mac may think that these measures are good enough to support students during a pandemic. However, a break is not enough for me and it likely isn’t enough for many other students.
The way I see it is that Mac is focusing on strategies to cope with stress when they could be focusing on how to give us a less stressful workload. After all, we wouldn’t need breaks to deal with our increased levels of stress if we had less stress in the first place.
Students shouldn’t feel the need to “hold on” until reading week in order to be okay
Fall reading week has come and gone this year and I don’t know about you, but it felt like a blur.
Many Canadian universities, including McMaster University, have introduced a fall reading week in response to increased stress and mental illnesses in post-secondary students. Although introducing a week-long break from classes seems ideal in alleviating school-related stress, a 2018 study conducted at McMaster found that supporting students’ mental health is a bit more complicated than that. The study, which was conducted in 2015 when the fall break was introduced, found that although students had fewer stressors after reading week, they felt higher levels of stress overall.
Although introducing a week-long break from classes seems ideal in alleviating school-related stress, a 2018 study conducted at McMaster found that supporting students’ mental health is a bit more complicated than that.
Many students commented that because of the added break, a shortened semester resulted in them having an increased number of midterms and assignments that occurred right after the break. So even though there was a break from classes, reading week is often spent studying or worrying about upcoming assessments.
Although this study was conducted five years ago, much of the data is still relevant. Since first-year, I’ve been fortunate enough to have a full reading week for the fall and winter semesters, but each year I’ve felt the need to catch up on work that was either overdue or prepare for a hectic week of assignments after the break. Reading week is simply not enough to support students’ wellbeing — and it is especially not enough if instructors just condense the work we have to do to “make up” for lost time during the break.
The university has a lot of work to do in order to give us an actual, restful break that helps improve our mental health. Second-year hit me hardest in terms of stress and as a result, I deferred two fall exams. As a result, I had to write two exams during the winter reading week. This meant that on top of taking my full course load, I had to prepare for two final exams right in the middle of the semester when many of my winter courses also had midterms or major assignments' deadlines coming up. While these week-long breaks are supposed to be for our mental health, the winter break exacerbated my stress that year.
This past reading week seemed even less restful, which was likely due to online classes and the pandemic. As our whole semester has been spent at home, spending another week — well, at home — didn’t really offer me with that mental pause in work and assignments. Yes, I didn’t have any synchronous classes to attend, but due to part of my course load being asynchronous, I already had fewer classes that I needed to attend synchronously this semester.
What I did have this reading week was a lot of work to catch up on or prepare for next week. This tends to be the norm for students every year, but with the anxieties surrounding COVID-19, being isolated from your friends and family and not being able to go out many places, this week was a lot more exhausting for me. Since in-person social interaction was limited and I was at home for the entirety of the week, every day I felt like I needed to do work and be productive.
I had a paper that was due right before reading week and four assignments due the week after — so of course, right after I finished my paper, I wanted to start working on the assignments so that their deadlines didn’t loom on the horizon.
Student mental health is more than just having a mid-semester break from classes and assignments. Many students like myself find that we just need to hold on until reading week; to simply finish our work and that as long as we don’t burn out until then, we will be okay. But once it’s reading week, we are allowed a moment to breathe before we must pick ourselves up and dust ourselves off again and continue working until we finish our exams — the light at the end of the tunnel. Then this cycle continues for the winter semester until summer break — unless you have spring or summer courses or work a job, of course. In that case, there are even fewer breaks that allow you to take a breather and actually, truly relax.
Student mental health is more than just having a mid-semester break from classes and assignments.
Giving us a reading week is a band-aid solution to a much larger problem. Students shouldn’t feel the need to “push through” to reading week and then “push through” to the end of exams.
If McMaster wanted to ensure students had a restful break, fall exams wouldn’t be deferred to a break meant for our mental health. If McMaster wanted to ensure students had a restful break, we shouldn’t be overloaded with midterms, assignments and papers right before or after reading week.
I don’t have all the answers or solutions on how to improve student mental health. But what I do know is that if we want to truly support students, we need to do more than just providing two reading weeks.
By Mads Clement, Contributor
cw: mental health, suicide
In 2018, the Student Representative Assembly voted to rescind the Peer Support Line (PSL), an anonymous hotline that existed to support students and their mental health.
PSL offered students a place to chat with another student trained in peer support about difficulties that they were experiencing. These challenges could range from relationship issues to academic problems.
According to a former vice president (administration) of the McMaster Students Union, the main reason the PSL was rescinded was because it received too many “crisis calls”, which posed a liability to all parties involved. Given student staff were not trained in crisis management or how to address calls with students experiencing suicidal ideation, this is a reasonable concern.
However, closing a mental health-based service has had negative impacts on the student body. We have lost one more resource on our already very small list of mental health resources. Anonymous peer support is extremely valuable. These services can be accessed without the fear of your name being officially attached to your mental health issues and because peers can relate to you on levels that adult therapists often cannot. Having someone who can relate to you without worrying about whether you will be institutionalized is an important facet of mental health care.
For these reasons and many others, students were outraged by the closing of PSL. We took to Twitter and Facebook, asking for answers as to why such a valuable service would be rescinded. It’s hard to find mental health care on campus, and reducing our options makes it even harder.
I actually received a reply from a member of the SRA to my outraged tweets where they wrote; “actually, there are 4 new counsellors that have been added to increase 4,000 hours of counselling to decrease the waiting time that students face when accessing the Student Wellness Centre.”
There are three main reasons why this resolution is an issue.
Problem number one: as mentioned above, going to a therapist is not the ideal option for everyone, as some students are likely to have minimal shared experiences with therapists. This especially applies to marginalized folks; patients of colour are less likely to find a racialized therapist that understands the impacts of systemic racism on their mental health. 2SLGBTQ+ students face a similar struggle when dealing with cisgender, heterosexual therapists. The same can be said of various other marginalized identities.
The second problem is that four more therapists isn’t enough. Ask anyone who goes to therapy at the SWC about how long they wait for appointments. In the majority of cases, there’s a two week to one month gap in between appointments. This is not adequate. On top of that, the therapists and counsellors are so swamped with students that they rarely have time to dedicate care to their patients beyond a surface level interaction. Mental health problems often run a lot deeper than what therapists are able to deal with because of their volume of patients.
Since there are many students floundering for mental health care outside of the SWC and PSL, more pressure has been put on the MSU peer support services: Women and Gender Equity Network, the Pride Community Centre, Student Health Education Centre and Maccess. These services, like PSL, are run by students who have entry level peer support training and are not compensated for their work. They are not equipped to handle the volume of students coming to them for help, let alone the degree of mental distress some of their space users are in. These students are not trained therapists.
Additionally, the majority of students that volunteer for these services are marginalized, which leads to the issue of marginalized students taking on all the mental health work on campus. These students, because of the pressures in their own lives and the added pressures of dealing with the mental health crises of others that they can’t always handle, often develop their own mental health problems and also need support or therapy. This system is unbalanced and unsustainable.
We need a balance of both therapists and peer support services. Therapists can provide specialized care to those who need it, but they are at capacity at McMaster University right now. We need more therapists; specifically therapists who have experiences with marginalization. It’s super weird talking about institutionalized transphobia with a cisgender, heterosexual person. This needs to change.
In addition, the MSU peer support services need more funding and volunteers should be compensated for their work. They put hours of unpaid labour into an unforgiving system that does not support them.
McMaster needs to rework its mental health support systems, and it needs to do this as urgently as possible. Everyone suffers when mental health services are limited, not just mentally ill folks.
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