I am Margaret Johnson, a 14-year-old student. I attend St Edward’s Church of England Academy, Romford, and I am also a member of the Havering Youth Council and an advocate for mental health. I recently took part in the Student Voice Workshop about mental health with the Department for Education (DfE). The workshop was about young people’s mental health in schools and how the Department for Education is trying to do more to promote the well-being of students. After attending the DfE workshop, I came to the realisation that society as a whole could do a lot more to educate young people as well as encourage us to talk about our mental health. It should be normalised for young people to talk about their mental health. Teenagers should no longer feel isolated due to the stigma attached to expressing their feelings and talking about their mental well-being. We have lived through two years of the Covid pandemic and changes in society as a whole have affected the well-being of young people severely. There is an ongoing cycle that starts with teenagers feeling insecure and can lead, in some cases, to self-harm and even suicide risks. According to NHS research, the amount of school children who struggle with mental health problems has increased from one in nine in 2017 to one in six in 2022. I wonder if you’ve ever wondered what we as a community are doing to help young people? From personal experience, I know that a large amount of stress and pressure from exams can negatively affect mental health. A close friend of mine said “I don’t know how it feels not to be stressed because I’m stressed all the time”. This is the story of our young people today.
I interviewed a number of my fellow students who agreed that social media creates unrealistic expectations that affect their mental health. We live in a world where young people are bombarded by social media from an early age. We are all
impacted by it. This has had a variety of effects on how young people behave and how they act, but it has had a particularly large impact on young people’s mental health. Young people are continually bombarded with false expectations about how they should look and act, as well as the types of diets they should follow and exercise they should take in order to achieve the ‘ideal’ body. The harsh reality is that it causes young people to continuously judge and compare themselves to unrealistic media representations, potentially leading to behaviour that can be damaging. Maya Angelou once said “I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.” This is key when considering unrealistic expectations imposed by social media and the subsequent judgement and even bullying when you don’t conform. Unfortunately, bullying will have a very detrimental effect on a person’s wellbeing: a ‘joke’ could end up resulting in someone being depressed, having low self esteem or feeling worthless and under-valued. The feeling you have once you have been bullied could make someone more self-conscious, and could lead someone to isolate themselves from others. Bullying causes physiological damage, the effects stay with a young person for a long time, like the feelings are tattooed and never leaves.
I interviewed Brian R Sallery, an NHS Governor for Forensic Mental Services. “During Covid, society in general has become more insulated and many of our social connections have been lost. Many people have stopped looking out for each other or fear getting involved”. We live in a generation where young people are exposed to a highly demanding world. It is currently said that teenagers are stressed more now than those 30 years ago. Did you know teens are reported to have stress levels higher than adults? (Source: https://www.developmentalscience.com/blog/2019/5/7/our-teens-are-more-stressed-than-ever)
Coping with mental health challenges can impact the decisions young people make in their life. It also makes it harder to achieve high grades, communicate effectively and form positive friendships. For example, having a heavy workload can result in students having a lot of stress and can lead to unhealthy coping mechanisms and a range of bad habits. I think that schools have a vital part to play and need to gain more understanding on how to support students when they face a lot of stress. In the world we live in today, students need to be explicitly taught how to deal with stress, rather than being just expected to deal with it. The training of teachers to deal with mental health issues in the classroom would be a good move forward.
Young people themselves are a wonderful source of help and advice. Schools should be encouraged to train student mentors to help their peers. This is essentially when older students receive training to mentor and advise younger students. Students who are peer mentored benefit from talking to trained peers. I think schools are in a wonderful position to help support the education of children about mental health. Educating children about mental health can help them to identify the signs within themselves and other people so that they can seek the right support if necessary. One way to educate children is to have a regular focus on mental health in schools, including through assemblies and the curriculum. Extra-curricular activities can also help, like clubs where students complete mindfulness or yoga, so children can relax and feel safe. Finally, if you have taken only one thing from this article, I would want it to be that we need to talk explicitly about mental health and we need to educate our community before it’s too late. We need to discuss mental health issues freely and honestly and need to give young people a chance to speak up about their own struggles. Please, if you can, be the spark of change that can make all the difference for the young people in your life.