Kookmin University (KMU) President Yim Hong-Jae and Student Life Counseling Center Manager Nam Suk-Kyung are reinforcing recovery support services to improve the mental health and psychological stability of students in the COVID-19 era.

The KMU Student Life Counseling Center helps students have a healthy school life through personal and group counseling. It mainly works to address the concerns of enrolled students in terms of mental health, personality, interpersonal relationships, and career.

In particular, the center actively supports trauma recovery in relation to the tragic mass casualty incident of Oct. 29 and supports the integrated psychological support system.

Those eligible for program support will be undergraduate and graduate students. Emergency psychological support is a support measure designed to help students heal and recover from trauma caused by direct or indirect exposure to various media or videos in this case.

The Korean Counseling Psychological Association’s “How to Recover from Psychological Disaster” is conducted in the form of card news to provide students and guides with free psychological support to help students recover.

In addition, through the Emergency One-on-One Psychological Counseling Service, the situation of student survivors and witnesses is checked, and psychotherapy is provided in cooperation with internal experts and institutions according to the severity of the crisis.

Meanwhile, the counseling center provides various programs designed to meet students’ daily needs. Consolation kits and telephone counseling are also being provided for COVID-19 patients and special lectures are being held separately through one-day classes. The center helps students manage their stress in various ways including aromatherapy, special lectures on color psychology, and sleep health, for which specialists are invited.

In addition, various school life adaptation programs have been introduced. Peer counseling, online group counseling programs, and mind healing group counseling programs are also being operated. Also, the “Mental Health Talk Concert” and “Life-Saving Education” with psychiatrists are being conducted to help students cope with their psychological difficulties.

The center is expected to help students improve their mental health and awareness of mental health by providing various psychological support programs in the future.

Manager Nam Suk-Kyung said, “I hope the counseling center will serve as a place for students to rest and talk when they are tired.” She also said that the counseling center will continue making efforts to improve students’ mental health and happiness with their school life.

Lee Wan-Jun
Reporters

mic0514@kookmin.ac.kr