Fostering well-being and a sense of community – results of the TreSilienssi project in the spring of 2021
One of the first tackled challenges was to improve students' possibilities of finding existing support services and other possibilities in the community. From this, the #parvi concept was born along with a landing page for student well-being on the Student's Guide. TreSilienssi cooperated with other services to launch the #parvi concept. Throughout the spring, Tampere University continued to develop the Navigaattori service as an accessible way to provide help for students.
Directly contacting students, mapping out the needs for support and offering help have been focal points in the project in the spring. At Tampere University, the project has used student data to find individuals who could be experiencing problems with their studies or well-being. Starting with Bachelor's degree students, the project contacted them by e-mail and by phone. This is being expanded to Master's students in the summer. TAMK approached all students by text message, introducing support services and free-time activities, as well as providing the option to ask for a direct contact from the counselling services. In addition, TAMK contacted first- and second-year student groups, and communicated directly with students who asked to talk with someone or ones who were identified by teacher tutors and other support staff.
Over the pandemic, students experiences of loneliness and lack of community support have increased. To strenghten the community and sense of belonging, the whole university community, together with student organisations and stakeholders, must act as one. To support students' free time, TreSilienssi has promoted, for example, free-time activities by Learning Lab. At TAMK, several small groups were started to support students' well-being. For example, the Sparris workshops and groups led by students themselves responded to the needs of students. At the University, the project supported the online study skill modules offered by the study psychologists. To support studying during the pandemic, both universities started Get Stuff Done! -study sessions in early April.
In the TreSilienssi project, one of the key elements is cooperation with the universities and student unions. This cooperation has started in the spring, with the most substantial activity being the planning of event funding for student organisations.
The project welcomed additional help over the spring from, among others, study counsellors, interns and student well-being advisors. Ypurs truly, Mikko Salminen and Anna Laurila started as TreSilienssi coordinators. Later in the spring, specialist Jasmin Rantanen and well-being advisor Johanna Virtanen were added to the team. The task of us, the project coordinators, is to make sure the project runs smoothly and that the spirit of cooperation is upheld. If you have any thoughts on how to improve our common well-being in Tampere Universities, don't hesitate to contact us.
Enjoy the summer,
Anna & Mikko
