By Vice President Raquel Marques

My main priority this year is mental health. When I finally graduated in July, I remembered why my last year, especially the last part, was so tough - I completely stopped doing all the activities that I once cared about because the academic pressure got the best of me.

This happened to me and I know it happens to so many more students, which is part of the reason why I decided to run Stressed Out Students.

I asked some students and members of staff: what do you do to relieve stress? Most of the answers were quite different, because each person as their own way. Based on this, the S.O.S campaign has a huge variety of activities that will hopefully remind you to balance your time in a better way, so you can still do the activities that you love. The Stressed Out Students activities are happening in the last two weeks of January and closer to that date I’ll post the full plan.

Meanwhile, I managed to bring dogs on campus! This was an extremely successful event, highly attended by students. We collaborated with “All Dogs Matter” to raise funds for this shelter and in the end students helped raise 200 pounds! This activity, once again, is not directly involved with mental health, it’s just to remind you to take a break.

Last but not least, I managed to convince the university to get the mental health first aid course back on the IPL programme and starting next year all students and staff will be able do it for free!

To find out more about the Stressed Out Students events we're organising in January 2018, please visit www.mdxsu.com/sos