By Najma Sultan and Neo Lekhela
Online classes, on the whole, have affected students’ mental health negatively. When Covid-19 made online classes compulsory in many universities over lockdown, some students avoided participating in class altogether.
Other students say they didn’t want to attend their online lessons because their anxious thoughts tended to take over.
The unnecessary stress that many students feel has had an adverse affect on their online performance. Research from Child Mind has shown that students with existing mental health issues are set to worsen due to online schooling.
King’s College London university student Anthony Asibey, 22, said: “Online learning really negatively impacted my mental health.”
In addition, a lack of in-person interaction has allowed them to get used to the comfort of not participating in class, which could make things even more difficult when classes got back to normal. For the students who had the anxiety of participating in class in general, online class had made it worse.
Asibey said: “I felt very self-conscious about putting my camera and microphone on because I’ve always felt embarrassed about people seeing my bedroom.”
Anxious thoughts may include: Will the teacher pick on me? Am I meant to know this content? What if my Wifi stops working? and what if my background is not good enough?
These types of thoughts will prevent a student from attending their online classes, which could impact their grades significantly. In fact,statistics from Childmind show that school refusal rates have gone up by 30% from online schooling.
The mental health charity Mind surveyed young people about their mental health during Covid. They found:
- “Nearly one in three adults (30%) and over one in three young people (34%) said that their mental health has got much worse during the pandemic.
- “Over half of young people (59%) said they will enjoy school, college or university more once restrictions ease. But around one in five (21%) do not think they will enjoy school, college or university without restrictions.
- “Young people want more information and education about mental health in school, college, university or work.”
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