Did you know that September is National Suicide Prevention Month?  To mark this occasion, the University of Iowa is issuing an invitation for all UI staff and faculty to increase their ability to recognize distress and recommend resources.  UI staff members have frequent discussions about mental health and wellness in their interactions with students, patients, and colleagues.  Most of the time, these conversations are routine, but sometimes they can become more concerning. 

To better understand the training resources available, Staff Council member Carl Follmer participated in the Kognito: At-Risk training module for UI staff and faculty.  This training is a collaboration between Graduate Programs Student Government, Division of Student Life, Scanlan Center for Mental health and HR, which provides faculty/staff a helpful tool to help others in distress.  According to the Office of Human Resources:

Kognito: At-Risk is a 45-minute interactive role-play simulation that builds awareness, knowledge and skills about mental health and suicide prevention.  It prepares faculty and staff to help support students (or staff) exhibiting signs of psychological distress, talk about concerns and, if needed, connect with support services.  The scenarios are student facing but the skills learned are generalizable to working with staff and colleagues or anyone for whom you are concerned.  In 2021 96% of UI users ‘strongly agreed’ they would recommend At Risk training to their colleagues. 97% of respondents agreed that participating increased their confidence in managing student distress. 

Kognito is a different style of training than staff may be used to.  It takes a few moments to adapt to getting instruction from, and conversing with, an avatar.  This format, however, creates an interactive environment that allows users to engage with a “choose-your-own-adventure” learning style.  The dialogue in each scenario includes situations and language that staff are likely to encounter with students or colleagues.  As each scenario progresses, users must make conversational decisions based on a list of available options.  A virtual coach gives guidance about how users can best support the student.  If a user decides at any point to take a different path, they can go backwards in the conversation and try again.  Kognito’s ability to engage staff in difficult, yet risk-free, conversations is a unique opportunity every staff and faculty member should participate in.  You can enroll in Kognito: At Risk anytime by going to the My Training page on the HR Self-Service site and searching for “suicide prevention”.

For more information visit https://hr.uiowa.edu/SUICIDE-PREVENTION