PROMOTING POSITIVE MENTAL HEALTH IN GEOSCIENCE CLASSROOMS

The ongoing mental health crisis has had a significant impact on higher education. Students, however, sometimes characterize their STEM faculty, including Geoscience instructors, as insensitive or silent on these effects. We aim to raise awareness about the content of earth science courses that can be anxiety-provoking, and to share ideas and resources for addressing students’ concerns.

Some course content, such as information on environmental degradation and natural disasters, can easily provoke anxiety among students. Other examples may not be as apparent and include predictions about the fate of the Earth as the Sun enters a red giant phase in about 5 Ga as well as facts about the number of species that ever lived and are now extinct, the average life span of animal species (in relation to human evolution), and the current rates of extinction. Some students report leaving geoscience classrooms with “a new existential crisis” after being presented with such information. Another clear example is climate-change induced anxiety. In the 2023 documentary “Gen Z Mental Health: Climate Stories,” youth report lived experiences and feeling scared and hopeless about the future.

Geoscience instructors need to be aware of potentially disturbing content so that it can be presented with compassion and proper trigger warnings, without sensationalism, and within larger contexts, such as the concept of “deep time” that provides a framework for better comprehension of complex information. The instructors could consult available resources and share them with students. For example, an entry on “Climate Change and Mental Health Issues” from the website “Climate in Arts & History: Promoting Climate Literacy Across Disciplines” (www.science.smith.edu/climatelit/climate-change-and-mental-health-issues/) has a list of resources that includes the “Gen Z Mental Health” film (www.climatementalhealth.net/genzfilm), which encourages community connection and advocacy for building emotional resilience. To further promote positive mental health, Geoscience faculty should keep in mind that “not every student on campus needs direct clinical care, but they all can benefit from a culture of caring and compassion” – as quoted from May 2023 Inside Higher Ed podcast on “Mental Health and ‘Expectable’ vs. ‘Unmanageable’ Discomfort.”