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THE UNIVERSITY OF EXETER’S INDEPENDENT STUDENT NEWSPAPER SINCE 1987
14 MAR 2016 | ISSUE 652 | TWITTER: @EXEPOSE | WWW.FACEBOOK.COM/EXEPOSE | FREE
“We can’t be the NHS” • Head of Student Services hits back at Wellbeing criticism • Student perception of underfunding for Centre dispelled • Expansion “should be on the books” as demand continues to rise
Susannah Keogh News Editor
U
Photo: Edwin Yeung
EXCLUSIVE Sarah Gough & Fiona Potigny Editor & News Editor
T
HE Wellbeing Centre has defended its service provision following numerous student criticisms over waiting times, lack of appropriate specialist support and alleged “underfunding”. Speaking exclusively to Exeposé, Head of Student Services, Jamie Horsley, described the service as doing “very well in an impossible place”, as it is “being asked to provide services that were never quite the original intention”. “People are expecting us to be the NHS and better,” she commented, “That’s
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a whole next level of funding and provision, we’d have to have a replication of an NHS mental health surgery”. Commenting on current students’ attitudes, Horsley said: “It’s a bit disheartening to see the conflation between NHS and Wellbeing because it’s perpetuating the idea that we can be the NHS and we can’t be. “The original focus around Wellbeing is around support to study, low-level mental depression, anxiety, transition to university, problems with flatmates and problems with family.” She described the more “serious demand around very severe mental health problems” as “beyond [their] remit”. Following criticisms levelled in Exeposé’s coverage of eating disorder care, Mark Sawyer, Head of Wellbeing, ex-
pressed concern that “it may not even be safe” for the Centre to attempt to provide treatments for higher risk conditions as most of its current support services revolve around talking therapies and Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT). He continued: “Sometimes the kind of issues that people come with are fairly chronic presentations - they’re quite complicated mental health issues. In those cases, I think our role is to signpost or help students access more specialist support that they need from the NHS. We’re a first port of call.” Despite criticism over lengthy waiting times, the queue for Wellbeing is currently between 14 and 18 days on average - in line with and often beating the NHS, where the maximum wait is 18 weeks. Sawyer said: “I think there’s a myth sur-
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rounding us that if you go to Wellbeing, you’ll never get seen. I don’t think that’s true. If we feel we can’t see you in six weeks, we’ll put you in touch with another agency.” Part of Wellbeing acting as a “first port of call”, however, means the Centre are more frequently having to deal with ‘crisis management’. Horsley told Exeposé: “We are struggling in the very severe cases, they are absorbing a lot of time and resources, I can count a few students who in two days probably used up their nine grand. “One recent Friday in the past month, Wellbeing had seven students with significant risks. People were called out and that was their whole day; they got nothing else done for any other students. Then...
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NIVERSITY on campus accommodation rents have increased for the third year running, in a move criticised by the Students’ Guild with Freshers at Holland Hall set to pay over seven thousand pounds for a thirty two week let from September 2016. All of the University-catered halls, bar Moberly which has dropped by 30 pence, have increased for the 2016/17 academic year, in addition to increases across the self-catered sector. In response, the Students’ Guild have claimed Exeter students are facing a “growing cost of living crisis.” When the new rents are applied, students from a household with the national average income of between £42,000-£62,000 will only be able to afford to meet living costs and pay their rent on a choice of 42 rooms on campus, without having to run up a personal debt of any description. Although rents have been held at the existing rate for 778 beds in the upcoming academic year-equivalent to less than the population of Birks Grange Village, certain halls of residences, such as the self catered Duryard, have seen decreases but this is only by an ultimately insignificant nine pence. The largest increase in rent is for rooms in Holland Hall, where both standard and luxury rooms have increased at a rate of three per cent. Ensuites with a view have increased by £215.83, meaning yearly rent is now £7,415.19, compared to £7,071.68 for a standard room. There has been continual increase...
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