Reported by: Shang Yuekai
Translated by: Lu Haiyan
Edited by: Patti Broderick
Updated: 2012-3-12
Effective Spring 2012, Harbin Institute of Technology (HIT) initiated a peer counseling program whereby students are trained to identify peers in need of care, serve as a caring first-responder, and to encourage those who may need professional help to seek it in a timely fashion, announced a representative from HIT’s Counseling Center.
Counseling Center Vice Chief Zhu Yuemei reported that university students are demonstrating increasingly more symptoms of mental health problems due to grim employment prospects, more demanding educational standards, life challenges and emotional crises. The Peer Counseling Center is one more measure in providing a coordinated approach to reducing risk factors and increasing protective factors that foster a healthy educational environment at HIT. The strategy calls for four levels of assistance: university, school, dormitory and class.
Peer Counselors can promote social connectedness and resilience at the earliest and most non-threatening level by offering listening, empathy, guidance, and support in addition to services already available from Counseling Center staff (86413256 1st campus; 86283863 2nd campus) and HIT Hospital doctors (86418730). The Dean of Students of each School or Department will oversee the Peer Counselors while the Counseling Center staff will offer training to both Peer Counselors and each Dean of Students or their designate. The Dean of Students will receive national psychological training and will be responsible for selecting and managing the Peer Counselors.
The Final mentor list from the 975 candidates will be published shortly.
