{"id":1363,"date":"2025-08-11T14:58:36","date_gmt":"2025-08-11T05:28:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.flinders.edu.au\/student-news\/?p=1363"},"modified":"2025-08-12T10:09:55","modified_gmt":"2025-08-12T00:39:55","slug":"flinders-university-is-a-national-finalist-in-the-r-u-ok-barbara-hocking-memorial-awards","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.flinders.edu.au\/student-news\/2025\/08\/11\/flinders-university-is-a-national-finalist-in-the-r-u-ok-barbara-hocking-memorial-awards\/","title":{"rendered":"Flinders University national finalist in the R U OK? Awards"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Flinders University is a finalist in the R U OK? Barbara Hocking Memorial Awards in the category of Education (school, TAFE or university).<\/p>\n<p>The Barbara Hocking Memorial Award recognises and celebrates outstanding efforts to support R U OK? in their community. This is to encourage regular and meaningful conversations, and also engage with this as a message for any day of the year.<\/p>\n<p>In the nomination, Flinders University\u2019s commitment to fostering a mentally healthy and supportive learning environment, with the R U OK? message informing the approach, was articulated through the Flinders University Whole of University Wellbeing Strategic Plan (2021 \u2013 2025). This outlined continuous improvements in programs and resources to draw on the latest evidence in mental health and wellbeing for staff and students. Our R U OK? Day events were across all campus locations in South Australia and the Northern Territory. These events were crucial platforms for face-to-face interactions, encouraging meaningful conversations.<\/p>\n<p>However, the message was also promoted across social media channels, staff and student newsletters, and was a standard conversational prompt when engaging with students at the Oasis Student Wellbeing centre.<\/p>\n<p>The launch of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.flinders.edu.au\/betteru\">BetterU<\/a> has provided significant resources for student wellbeing with a strong focus on mental health, staff wellbeing was supported through Thriving@Flinders, and wellbeing strategies were embedded into curriculum through self-care, mental wellbeing and behaviour change workshops.<\/p>\n<p>Flinders University has developed a supportive learning environment that encourages open conversations, fosters connection, and champions the mental wellbeing of all students and staff to have the tools to manage their own mental health and support their peers.<\/p>\n<p><em>The winner of the R U OK? Barbara Hocking Memorial Award in the category of Education (school, TAFE or university) will be announced on the 18<sup>th<\/sup> August 2025. <\/em><\/p>\n<p>In 2025, R U OK? Day takes place on the 11<sup>th<\/sup> September, and again there are many plans in place for staff and students. There will be a mini-Wellbeing conference where staff are invited to pause, connect and explore what it means to be mentally healthy at work. There will also be campus activations for students to engage with Wellbeing Ambassadors (with a cupcake!) and Flinders University welcomes the R U OK? Conversation Convoy to Bedford Park on 17<sup>th<\/sup> September where there will be a BBQ and opportunities to connect.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Flinders University is a finalist in the R U OK? Barbara Hocking Memorial Awards in the category of Education (school, TAFE or university). The Barbara Hocking [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5834,"featured_media":1364,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1363","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorised"],"post_mailing_queue_ids":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.flinders.edu.au\/student-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1363","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.flinders.edu.au\/student-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.flinders.edu.au\/student-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.flinders.edu.au\/student-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5834"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.flinders.edu.au\/student-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1363"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.flinders.edu.au\/student-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1363\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.flinders.edu.au\/student-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1364"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.flinders.edu.au\/student-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1363"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.flinders.edu.au\/student-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1363"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.flinders.edu.au\/student-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1363"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}