Zayed University launches “Mental Health Facilitator” program

Zayed University has launched an initiative, the first of its kind in the country, to train a number of faculty and staff and make them qualified to know and find out about the psychological issues that students face. occasion of World Mental Health Day, which falls on October 10 each year.

The “Mental Health Facilitator” program, launched in 2015 in the United States of America, aims to train people outside the field of psychiatry in skills enabling them to help people with mental illness or trauma, and guide them for counseling and treatment, in response to the growing need for counseling and psychotherapy around the world. .

Zayed University Student Counseling Center is the first psychological counseling center accredited by the National Board of Certified Counselors and its affiliates (NBCC) to provide this type of training to people outside of the mental health field in the field of mental health. country.

The training includes an intensive program in which he deals with the most prevalent psychological problems and how to identify them, in addition to focusing on the principles of working with integrity, methods of assistance and counseling, and referring cases that require a more in-depth intervention to specialists in the field.

Dr Manal Saleh, Senior Psychological Advisor and Program Manager, said: “By presenting this program to members of the university, we aim to eliminate the surrounding aura and preconceptions that hang over psychological issues, in particular. those related to young people in the sensitive period. of life and encourage them to seek help.

She added: “We have so far trained 38 people, including 13 students, and 25 teachers and staff. After completing the training, these trainees, who have come to call themselves (mental health facilitators), are able to identify students and people who need psychological help as part of their daily work at the university. Thus, we have widened the reach of our team and brought it closer to the student, by creating an office called (Mental Health Gatekeeper Project), composed of a number of student mental health facilitators in order to help and guide their peers, in a simple and closer way, because they are from the same group of ‘age and share a lot of ideas, and if a mental health facilitator finds that a student needs a follow-up with a specialist, he will refer him to us for regular and in-depth assistance.