Scottish Church turns focus on mental health

Kolkata: After the mysterious death of a third-year Political Science student in the hostel of Scottish Church College last month, the college has decided to introduce counselling sessions for students' mental well-being and provide timely guidance to them. This was done after a survey conducted among 200 students, who had filled in their responses through a Google form shared by the college, showed that around 40% wanted to avail confidential counselling sessions. The college has about 1,500 students in total.
The college principal, Madhumanjari Mandal, said, "We appointed the counsellor even before the incident took place, and we expected that students would take the support of this facility, but in reality we rarely saw them visiting her. We felt we should organise well-being programmes for them so that those who need assistance can feel free to discuss" Lovelina Banerjee, the counsellor, said, "Even among those who filled in the form, some ticked the hesitation point mentioned in the form to show what they think about it." The principal stated that such counselling sessions are aimed at creating an atmosphere for students to feel free to seek assistance. Most higher education institutions are giving special emphasis to mental well-being issues and handling them carefully by appointing counsellors. At JU, daily counselling sessions take place from Monday to Friday, while at Presidency University, a counsellor visits the campus thrice a week. St Xavier's College has a counselling cell of four counsellors from Monday to Saturday. Father Dominic Savio, the principal of St Xavier's College, said, "It had been set up much before the pandemic. After the pandemic, we strengthened the activities of the cell from Monday to Saturday." Loreto College recently introduced a mental health service through its department of psychology.