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Where traditional learning and assessment approaches have previously been found to negatively impact on student well-being, the COVID-19 pandemic provided a novel opportunity to explore alternative online learning and assessment conditions conducive to student well-being and academic performance as part of a whole university strategy. To this end, the present study employed a mixed-methodological approach using a quantitative survey and 10 focus groups to examine the impact of online learning and assessment on the undergraduate students' well-being. The findings indicate that whilst some students report online learning and assessment to require more effort in comparison to traditional methods, other students value the increased flexibility afforded by online learning and assessment. It is recommended that academic staff scaffold online learning and assessment methods in the curriculum.

University student wellbeing is increasingly seen as a concern, and as demands on university staff time for research, teaching, leadership and pastoral support also increase, this is mirrored in concerns about staff wellbeing. Dominant sectoral narratives frame student and staff wellbeing as oppositional, with initiatives to support student wellbeing positioned as creating additional practical and emotional demands on staff time and resources. Using a large qualitative dataset collected in the UK, including staff and students, this paper argues that that this does not have to be the case. Instead, there is a need to look beyond the provision of reactive services or isolated individual interventions, to proactively and cohesively embed cultural and structural change across the whole institution to support positive wellbeing outcomes for the whole university community. We report on the intrinsic interconnection between staff and student wellbeing; the importance of formal institutional policies in supporting or impeding staff and student wellbeing; access to training interventions to support staff and student wellbeing as a practical manifestation of these policies; and the impact of workplace culture and the centrality of compassion and community. The paper finds that it is important that institutions within higher education acknowledge and respond proactively to both staff and student wellbeing issues. To do so, institutions should seek to foster a sustainable and effective academic environment with a whole university approach.

Whilst existing evidence has demonstrated the imperative of social integration, inclusion, and belonging for student mental health, students often report relational challenges, barriers, and stressors at university. Drawing on thematic analysis of six student co-creation panels conducted during the Student Minds University Mental Health Charter consultations, this paper aims to elucidate student perspectives and proposals for promoting mental health at university by enhancing interpersonal interactions and social relationships. In particular, student panels identified existing challenges and opportunities to address social isolation, conflict, and exclusion in interactions with peers, academic staff, and the local community. The findings of this paper both echo and develop the principles of good practice propounded by the University Mental Health Charter, whilst the implications for university policy in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic are also discussed.

This paper draws on staff and student consultations conducted during the development of Student Minds' University Mental Health Charter to identify five key tensions which can arise in assessment design and strategy when seeking to balance the wellbeing of students with pedagogical, practical and policy considerations. It highlights the need to acknowledge the pressures of assessment on staff wellbeing as well as students. The particular tensions explored include the need to balance challenge against the psychological threats this can entail; the varying impacts of traditional and novel forms of assessment; the differing demands of collaborative and individual work; the tensions between ideal strategies and those which are practically feasible; and the ways in which feedback is given (as a constructive learning tool) and received (often as a psychological threat). These tensions can provide a valuable point of reflection for educators who need to critically and proactively navigate these conflicts within their own assessment design and practices, as part of a wider whole university approach to promoting student wellbeing.

Δ3 -carene is a prominent monoterpene in the atmosphere, contributing significantly to secondary organic aerosol (SOA) formation. However, knowledge about Δ3 -carene oxidation pathways, particularly regarding their ability to form highly oxygenated organic molecules (HOMs), is still limited. In this study, we present HOM measurements during Δ3 -carene ozonolysis under various conditions in two simulation chambers. We identified numerous HOMs (monomers: C 7-10 H 10-18 O 6-14 ; dimers: C 17-20 H 24-34 O 6-18) using a chemical ionization mass spectrometer (CIMS). Δ3 -carene ozonolysis yielded higher HOM concentrations than α -pinene, with a distinct distribution, indicating differences in formation pathways. All HOM signals decreased considerably at lower temperatures, reducing the estimated molar HOM yield from ∼ 3 % at 20 °C to ∼ 0.5 % at 0 °C. Interestingly, the temperature change altered the HOM distribution, increasing the observed dimer-to-monomer ratios from roughly 0.8 at 20 °C to 1.5 at 0 °C. HOM monomers with six or seven O atoms condensed more efficiently onto particles at colder temperatures, while monomers with nine or more O atoms and all dimers condensed irreversibly even at 20 °C. Using the gas- and particle-phase chemistry kinetic multilayer model ADCHAM, we were also able to reproduce the experimentally observed HOM composition, yields, and temperature dependence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Δ3-carene is a prominent monoterpene in the atmosphere, contributing significantly to secondary organic aerosol (SOA) formation. However, knowledge about Δ3-carene oxidation pathways, particularly regarding its ability to form highly oxygenated organic molecules (HOM), is still limited. In this study, we present HOM measurements during Δ3-carene ozonolysis under various conditions in two simulation chambers. We identified numerous HOM (monomers: C7-10H10-18O6-14, dimers: C17-20H24-34O6-18) using a chemical ionization mass spectrometer (CIMS). Δ3-carene ozonolysis yielded higher HOM concentrations than a-pinene, with a distinct distribution, indicating differences in formation pathways. All HOM signals decreased considerably at lower temperatures, reducing the estimated molar HOM yield from ~3 % at 20 °C to ~0.5 % at 0 °C. Interestingly, temperature change altered the HOM distribution, increasing the observed dimer-to-monomer ratios from roughly 0.8 at 20 °C to 1.5 at 0 °C. HOM monomers with 6 or 7 O-atoms condensed more efficiently onto particles at colder temperatures, while monomers with nine or more O-atoms and all dimers condensed irreversibly even at 20 °C. Using the gas and particle-phase chemistry kinetic multilayer model ADCHAM, we were also able to reproduce the experimentally observed HOM composition, yields and temperature dependence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Independent learning is frequently identified as instrumental to student success within higher education. Although there is a significant body of literature demonstrating the importance of independent learning for retention and progression, to date, the relationship between independent learning and student wellbeing within higher education has been under-explored. This article addresses the gap in the literature by interrogating this relationship, with a particular emphasis on the barriers and enablers to independent learning and the implications for the wellbeing of university students as part of a whole university approach. Drawing on data from a large national student survey and nine focus groups with university staff conducted during the formulation of the University Mental Health Charter, the findings demonstrate important intersectionalities between independent learning and student wellbeing. In particular, they highlight that facilitating independent learning has the potential to allow students to flourish in higher education but only when factors relating to accessibility, inclusivity, expectations, and goals are explicitly addressed. Going forward, it is imperative that these links are more widely acknowledged and addressed within higher education research, policy, and practice to ensure that students are supported to develop as learners during both their transition into university and their journey through and beyond their studies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Analysis of lived experience data is increasingly advocated as an enabling strategy to inform ethical and effective policy and practice, particularly in the university mental health field. However, where Michel Foucault's work is often drawn on to frame subjectivity of lived experience in the neoliberal university, this brings forth epistemological, methodological, and ethical tensions in using student voice to inform changes in mental health policy and practice. In Foucauldian terms, a double bind emerges wherein the power of student voice to destabilise existing forms of mental health knowledge and to reimagine the distress-inducing power structures within the neoliberal university are recuperated to (re)produce the same neoliberal structures and subjectivities. Drawing on data from 10 student focus groups, this study explores the epistemic, methodological, and ethical questions attached to analysis of student lived experience data in the context of a Foucauldian-informed understanding of the neoliberal university. It is argued that in pragmatist terms, whilst student voice must be contextualised within the socio-material and socio-psychological context of the neoliberal system to ensure beneficial consequences for student experience, a Foucauldian approach to interpreting lived experience data can also re-empower the subject with the freedom to resist and disrupt the reproduction of mentally unhealthy structures within the neoliberal system as part of a whole university approach. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]