Lawrenceville Community Prioritizes Teen Mental Health

With adolescent mental health and wellness gaining even more attention over the past year, Lawrenceville students, faculty, and staff are making a point to share resources, tips and support with the school community.

Throughout February, the student-run Lawrenceville Key Club, part of the international student-led service club, focused their events and outreach on mental health.

“We’re all spread across the world in different countries and we’re all going to school virtually,” said Quincy Leung ‘22, Lawrenceville Key Club co-president, who is based in Hong Kong. “It’s easy to feel isolated and generally fatigued by having to face your screen all day. We thought it would be a good reminder to everyone - not just students, but faculty and staff - that we are here for each other and there are resources that can help improve our well-being.”

Sofiya Belovich ‘22, a Key Club co-president from Kazakhstan, added that the club leaders decided to host a fundraiser to support AIM, a nonprofit dedicated to youth mental health. They ran a challenge promoting exercise, awarding prizes for greatest distance covered, and had faculty do the virtual fitness challenge as a reward for miles earned. They also hosted two virtual guest speakers on mental health topics, Olympic silver-medalist Leon Taylor and clinical psychologist Dr. Hayley Watson, and shared mental health and wellness tips throughout the month on their Instagram account @lvillekeyclub.

Lawrenceville’s Bunn Library also shared weekly tips on Instagram drawn from their Teen Health & Wellness database, which provides support and self-help tools on topics including mental health, nutrition, drugs, illness, and many other aspects of physical and emotional well being.

From sharing tips for breathing through anxiety episodes, to managing a heavy workload, to promoting the link between aerobic exercise and improved mood, the Library showcased the critically acclaimed, award-winning Teen Health & Wellness database resources. Additional database topics include diseases, drugs and alcohol, nutrition, mental health, suicide and bullying, green living, LGBTQ+ issues, and more. The resource offers a “calm room” and links to hotlines for immediate support.

Lawrenceville’s counseling department also offered a virtual forum for faculty before spring break, where teachers could bring questions and concerns about general topics in student mental health, and have them answered by Lawrenceville’s trained counselors.

Dr. Dee Apple, director of Lawrenceville’s counseling and psychological services, led the meeting by sharing sobering statistics on the increasing rates of mental health diagnoses among adolescents during the COVD-19 pandemic. Faculty then discussed helpful strategies with counselors, such as having one-on-one check-ins with students, and hosting relaxed, informal chat sessions, to foster much-needed socialization. The group also discussed keeping an eye out for openings to discuss mental health concerns, and strategies for linking students with counseling resources.

Medical Director Bruce Kraut added that while Lawrenceville is committed to promoting COVID-cautious behaviors during the spring term when students return to campus, that does not preclude the need for personal connections.

“Our goal is social intimacy in a physically distant situation,” he emphasized.

For more information about Lawrenceville’s Health and Wellness resources, visit https://www.lawrenceville.org/campus-life/health-and-wellness.

For additional information, please contact Lisa M. Gillard Hanson, director of Public Relations, at lgillard@lawrenceville.org.