A social enterprise providing education and information to protect and enhance the mental health of young people
Susan Hazel, University of Adelaide Cats have lived with humans for thousands of years. And long before cat memes and viral TikToks took over the internet, they’ve been comforting us with their purrs and making us laugh with their weird antics. But what does the research say – are cats good for us? Living with [...]
John Sommers-Flanagan, University of Montana Uncommon Courses is an occasional series from The Conversation U.S. highlighting unconventional approaches to teaching. Title of Course Evidence-Based Happiness for Teachers What prompted the idea for the course? I was discouraged. For nearly three decades, as a clinical psychologist, I trained mental health professionals on suicide assessment. The work [...]
Judith Ireland, The Conversation and Matt Garrow, The Conversation The Albanese government has announced it will introduce a social media ban for children. The government has not yet nominated a minimum age but is trialling age-assurance mechanisms for those aged 13–16. Prime Minister Anthony Albanese says the legislation will be introduced this year. This follows [...]
Michael Koch, Brunel University of London and Sarah Park, University of Leicester Emily, a finance manager, has been working 60-hour weeks for several months to meet deadlines. She starts feeling constantly exhausted, both physically and mentally. Work that she once found engaging now seems overwhelming, and she’s easily irritated with her colleagues. Despite putting [...]
Ian Gordon, The University of Melbourne; Mary P. Coupland, University of Technology Sydney, and Merrilyn Goos, University of the Sunshine Coast Imagine if you enrolled your child in swimming lessons but instead of a qualified swimming instructor, they were taught freestyle technique by a soccer coach. Something similar is happening in classrooms around Australia every [...]
Alison Bedford, University of Southern Queensland As Year 12 students begin term 3, they will be thinking increasingly about what to do next year. Throughout August, many universities have have open days as students investigate different courses and options for study. This is a significant time for young people as they navigate study pressures with [...]
Sam Sellar, University of South Australia This week, the national 2024 NAPLAN results were released. This was met with headlines raising alarm about one in three students not meeting literacy and numeracy standards. While these headlines may be worrying to parents, they do not say anything about individual students. Families have been receiving individual student [...]
Andrew J. Martin, UNSW Sydney and Rebecca J. Collie, UNSW Sydney Adolescence is often characterised as a time of “storm and stress”. Young people are dealing with physical and cognitive changes and, as they move from childhood, can become increasingly distant from the adults in their lives. In academic terms, this time of major hormonal [...]
Chris Speldewinde, The University of Melbourne In Australia we have a long history of taking children outdoors to learn about the natural environment. But thanks to computer games, tablets and busy lifestyles, children aren’t getting as much exposure to nature as they used to. “Bush kinders” are one way to counter this. In a bush [...]
Becky Freeman, University of Sydney This year the Australian government is introducing a series of measures to restrict the availability of vapes, starting today. The new reforms address loopholes in the current laws that allow easy access to highly addictive, flavoured, cheap, and harmful vaping products that are marketed to kids. Vaping products will still [...]
