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Indigenous Post-Secondary Mental Health Needs Assessment: Indigenous Staff Summary

Date

Jan 24, 2025

Topics

Policies & Strategic PlanningStress

Specific Populations

Faculty & StaffIndigenous Students

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Continuing with the work of the Indigenous Needs Assessment survey, CICMH aims to identify gaps in supporting Indigenous post-secondary staff with their mental health and wellbeing across Ontario, with the goal of improving mental health services for Indigenous staff from an Indigenous perspective. This year we added a French version of the survey to include the voices of Indigenous francophone staff.

Survey Results:

In total, 127 Indigenous staff responded to the survey with 124 from the English survey and 3 from the French survey. A majority of respondents identified their role as either front-line staff (counsellor, therapist, wellness/academic advisor), student-facing staff (mental health education), or administration/office clerks.

Institution

Indigenous Staff and Mental Health on Campus

Barriers to Providing Support to Indigenous Students: English Responses

Barriers to Providing Support to Indigenous Students: French Responses

“The phenomenon of identity is important. It even seems to be an intergenerational phenomenon. Students have been “self-identified” by their parents for many years, but they don’t know where their origins come from.”

Recommendations for a Psychology Safe Workplace: English/French Responses

When compared to last year’s findings the recommendations from Indigenous staff remain consistent, however, building relationships and improved workspace safety were new recommendations this year.

Mandatory All Staff Training:

One of the major themes found were concerns and the need for increased training for all staff. Respondents stated that mandatory training for all staff should be on cultural safety training to include Indigenous mental health perspectives, trauma-informed practice and care/intergenerational trauma (such as resources, training, how to manage trauma, and using a healing approach to care), and microaggressions in the workplace. For more information on trauma-informed practice and care please review our CICMH Trauma-Informed Practice & Care toolkit.

Relationship Building:

A second theme found was to establish and strengthen relationships amongst community and community organizations. Ideas include creating opportunities for alumni to participate on campus and act as a mentor or guest speaker to improve programing for students.

Indigenous Ways of Knowing:

A third common theme was the need to implement an Indigenous way of knowing perspective into the campus approach, policies, and curriculum. For example, having increased access to ceremony on campus, land-based learning, and Indigenous specific supports such as medicine people and Elders.

Compared to last year, these findings were similar, however, some comments extended to specific professional development training such as taking care of the self and work-life balance.

Improved Workspace Safety:

Amongst francophone staff, they identified improving workspace safety, such as improving the privacy and confidentiality of student consultations in office with the limited space they must work with.

“Western clinical mental services are not for everyone. Mental health supports need to meet students where they are instead of trying to fit students into a clinical framework. Wellness workers’ mental health also needs to be regularly assessed as they can cause harm to students.”