HEALTH PLUS:FIRST DAYS in new educational situations are usually a mixture of excitement and anxiety, writes Marie Murray
The first day in college is another first day. The importance of this can be overlooked because those who enter college are young adults. It can be assumed, therefore, that they are equipped to deal with this educational change without undue stress.
Additionally, because some students make the transition from second to third level accompanied by a large number of their classmates, it can seem to be an easy group process, rather than an individual event. But change is always stressful. Psychologically it is undertaken alone, even if in the company of many others.
Adjustment to college is significant, and individual resilience and capacity to cope varies from individual to individual and from context to context. While on the first day everyone may look as if they are confident, competent and undaunted by it all, most new students have normal appropriate, internal anxieties mixed with their joy at being there.
Unless the reality of adjustment is acknowledged and normalised, individual students may believe that they are personally failing to cope, rather than understanding that transitional fears, anxieties, confusion and uncertainty are normal emotions in new contexts.
Research shows that problematic transition to college and non-completion includes negative past educational experiences, poor prior levels of academic achievement, incapacity to meet course demands, financial problems and undertaking too much external paid work, poor family and other relationships, lack of clarity in career aspirations, poor accommodation, and lack of preparation for third level.
As in many life situations, it is the accumulation of ordinary things that overwhelm new students.
There are some people who cannot relate to the idea of students needing psychological support, and think that this is one more example of pampering the already privileged. They will argue that in the past no psychological attention was paid to students and that they made their transitions without all the psychobabble ballyhoo that now attends cosseted students.
But colleges were different places when those who attended were for the most part a privileged few, from "well-to-do" families with professional backgrounds, entering small faculties where they could be known personally by their individual professors, academic advisers, lecturers and tutors.
Times were different. Life was different. Demands were different. Expectations were different. Resources were different. Numbers were different.
The demographics have changed. The present is not the past. Comparisons cannot be made between the stresses that students may have experienced once, and the demands upon them now. Besides, young adulthood is a high-risk time for the emergence of psychiatric distress, of first episode psychosis and of substance abuse and addiction, statistically increased by the sheer numbers attending colleges and exacerbated by the achievement demands of university life.
It is important for families to be alert to this. Depression can mimic lethargy and laziness. Inability to cope may get expressed in substance use, self-harm or anger.
In the document A Vision for Change, the 2006 Government report of the expert group on mental health policy, it was noted that in addition to depression, anxiety, loneliness, social phobia and exam phobia experienced by some students, there are increasing numbers of students with complex psychological needs.
Mature students have particular needs and those who are parents suffer the eternal guilt of believing they are neglecting their studies when they give family time, and neglecting their children when they study.
International students, who make up an increasing proportion of the student population, also have special needs. Besides being away from home, many are not using their first language and are in new confusing cultural contexts often trying to break into established social groups to form friendships with others.
Having documented the pitfalls, let these words not cast a shadow over what is, for most people, a truly, special, cherished, unforgettable and magnificent time in their lives.
It is simply to say that if the transition is difficult "please talk" to someone, immediately about it, because going to college is a major transition and talking about it can help.
mmurray@irish-times.ie
• Marie Murray is director of the Student Counselling Services in University College Dublin. For information on support services and the Universities Please Talk Campaign see www.pleasetalk.ie