In the academic year 2016/2017, a peer support programme was introduced in the department. You may already be familiar with peer support, or have heard about it from your college. This blog reiterates the concept of peer support, introduces the departmental peer supporters and tells you a little more about what activities we have planned for the year ahead.
What is peer support?
In a nutshell, peer support is all about students supporting each other, and offers an informal, confidential, and most importantly, non-judgemental space for you to talk about anything that is on your mind.
As peer supporters, we are available to discuss problems and events of any size and nature. This could include challenging timelines and workload, academic performance or issues with supervisors and career choices, but also relationships, homesickness, depression, loss of friends or family members or anything else that you would like to talk about.
Also, if you feel that peer support is not sufficient to help with your situation, we can direct you to other sources for additional help.
To act as peer supporters, we have all completed extensive training, which is facilitated by the University Counselling Services. Additional information on the peer support programme is available on the University's website.
Who are the peer supporters?
Your friendly peer supporters are:
Ai Seon, ai.seon.kuan@ceu.ox.ac.uk (CEU – starting 3rd year in October 2017)
Blake, blake.thomson@balliol.ox.ac.uk (CTSU – starting 2nd year in October 2017)
Filipa, filipa.landeiro@dph.ox.ac.uk (HERC – submitted)
Ines, ines.rombach@ndorms.ox.ac.uk (HERC – recently graduated)
Jessica, jessica.renzella@dph.ox.ac.uk (CPNP – starting 2nd year in October 2017)
Peer support activities:
Drop-in sessions: We will arrange regular drop-in sessions, which will be advertised by email and on the term card. You can use these sessions to get to know us, or come to talk to us about anything that is on your mind.
Appointments: You can email us to arrange a time and date that suits you. We can meet anywhere at the Old Road Campus that is convenient, or we can book a meeting room for a little more privacy.
Other events: We also plan other welfare-related events for everyone to attend. These planned events range from talks organised within the department, to social teas and excursions (such as the picnic we recently had to cancel due to poor weather conditions). British weather really does make the latter activity difficult to plan!
We always welcome your feedback, comments and suggestions – and love when people stop to chat about all things welfare and non-welfare related.
Best wishes,
Ai Seon, Blake, Filipa, Ines & Jessica
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