Hey there!

How are you? Welcome to the Student Health and Well-being Blog. My name is Gareth and I am the eMental Health Project Officer with Health, Counselling and Disability Services. That is me in the photo above looking like a goober.

I am one of a team of general practitioners, nurses, counsellors, disability advisors and administrative officers who are located in the Student Centre on the Bedford Park campus. Our job is to help you address health and well-being issues that may be affecting your studies here at Flinders.

To learn more about what we do, please visit our website – http://www.flinders.edu.au/current-students/healthandcounselling/healthandcounselling_home.cfm

My personal background is in Psychology and I trained here at Flinders. I was part of the first group of students in SA to do the clinical PhD (naturally that makes us the best).

My intention with this blog is to explore multiple tools, tips, tricks, philosophies and ideas that you, as students, can use to enhance your health and well-being during your journey here at Flinders. Basically, you can sit back and watch as I head out into the world of health and well-being (not just psychology), learn some cool stuff, and let you know about in this blog.

I would love to be able to say that in my 40 or so years on this planet that I have worked out the secrets of happiness and well-being and can just tell you how to achieve them. That is not the case. But if you are willing to join me on this ride (subscribe to blog, come back and visit regularly, get in contact with me etc), then I reckon we can have a very interesting time trying to work out the meaning of it all (life that is).

There are at least four things that I hope to achieve with this blog.

The purpose of this blog is fourfold

1. To provide you (the students) with evidence-based insights and tools for improving your health and well-being during your time at Flinders. We’ll be covering lots of topics from how to manage study and academic demands, to how to be physically and mentally fit, have good relationships, and balance work/life demands.
2. To profile physical health, mental health and well-being activities that are taking place in the university, including helping you get to know the various services that are available to you as a student.
3. To feature and promote health-related research that is being done by staff and students across the university, and explore the implications of that research for your life as a student.
4. To review different health and well-being websites and apps to help you decide whether they might be of value to you during your time as a student.

I’ll be writing articles, making videos, recording podcasts and other cool stuff, so stay tuned. Also as part of maintaining this blog i’ll be heading out and about on campus to talk to students about what you find most challenging in being at university, and what kinds of tips and tricks you’ve learned to make  your time at uni both fun and productive.

If you want to get in contact with me, you can send me an email (gareth.furber@flinders.edu.au), check whether I am online on Skype (search eMental Health Project Officer Gareth) or find me on twitter (@Dr_Furber). I am really keen to hear from you about topics you’d like me to talk about on the blog.

Finally, for those doing research or providing services within the university related to health and well-being, please get in contact with me and lets see if we can translate what you do into practical tools and tips for students to maximise their well-being.

Have a good day (or night, depending on when you are reading this) – 🙂