Hacking our mental health

A couple weekends ago, Yale University hosted a hackathon — but this was no ordinary hackathon. Most hackathons are huge, packed with young, potential CS-concentrating undergraduates who are there for all the free stuff that the corporate sponsors are handing out and maybe some creative competition, too (this may or may not have been the case with Hack@Brown). But this one was smaller, full of health professionals and medical residents, and focused on an issue not commonly tackled in these types of competitions and not often talked about in the computer science world at all: mental health.This hackathon was a very wholesome event. Everyone was focused on creating something that could actually make a difference. Mentors were dedicated to helping each and every team succeed in whatever they were pursuing. Guest speakers were invited to talk about their own experiences with mental health issues. In the 24 hours allotted, my team was able to develop a feasible idea. By no means did we fully code and develop it, but this challenge wasn’t really about winning or necessarily creating something that would totally fix everything. It would be nice to have an application that could improve the accessibility of mental health resources and aid anxiety and such, but really, what this hackathon accomplished was getting the conversation going about the importance of mental health in the context of the tech world.At Brown, we talk about mental health decently. We let it be known that CAPS is available. Meiklejohns and other mentors often refer students to their services, and they themselves are available to talk to students about their lives in general. Project Lets and other student groups advocating for mental health have established visible presences on campus. However, many, if not all, of these groups and resources are student-led. When it comes to the university itself as an institution, on the other hand, there's still a lot of room for improvement. I've been at Brown for a semester and a half now, and the only time I remember seriously discussing mental health was during my pre-orientation program (shoutout to Third World Transition Program); orientation itself barely dealt with any of that. And once I was an established student on campus, I realized that while some academic departments might do an decent job of discussing mental health openly, others, such as the Computer Science department, don't.Last semester, there was a massive uptick in posts on "Dear Blueno"*  about certain classes —  mainly CS classes — that were really bringing people down in terms of mental health. Reading these posts made me genuinely concerned and I walked away with a sense of how little CS students at Brown feel supported in their mental health.Later, I was sitting in lecture for CS when the professor put up an image of Blueno next to a caption that read, “Dear Blueno, We understand some students have been telling you about feeling lost in CS18. Can you please encourage them to make an appointment so we can help them get back on track? We like hearing from students too…”It's great that this professor was making an statement about having heard students' concerns and wanting to address them. But at the same time, however, it's frightening that these concerns came to the professor's attention mainly in the form of anonymous Facebook posts. Somehow, it's become so normalized to pull all-nighters and spend countless hours in the Sunlab staring at a computer screen — at the detriment of one's wellbeing — that students feel like they can't actually talk about how they're struggling in a non-anonymous way.Last fall, the CS17 TAs sent out an email to all of us in the class about their own time in the 17/18 sequence, and shared their stories of struggling but eventually succeeding. I loved that they took the time to share it, and I loved that they wanted to tell us that we really could get through it. But it scared the shit out of me. I didn’t want to be spending ungodly hours in the Sunlab or in the lounge, staring at the computer screen. I didn’t want to be stress crying every week! It's important to note that this problem doesn't only exist in the CS department — lots of pre-meds in my chemistry classes really don’t seem to be having a good time, either, and it's not uncommon for people in history classes to stay up super late trying to write the perfect paper. The problem is that somehow, this kind of existence has become branded as normal. We’ve become used to the idea that it’s okay to sacrifice your mental health for success. We’ve adjusted to handling much longer hours than we really should, and we talk constantly about pulling all-nighters and running to get coffee. We joke about how much we hate ourselves because we put ourselves through this, but underneath the jokes it really does seem like we hate ourselves.This isn't okay. While working hard and attempting to achieve future goals is admirable and important, it's not worth sacrificing your own mental health. No matter where you end up, if your mental health is utter shit, you won’t be able to enjoy any of what you’ve got.It’s fantastic that we have CAPS and Project Lets and a ton of other advocate groups for mental health at Brown. However, the administration itself should do more to try to fix this issue. Furthermore, we as students should also take it upon ourselves to change this toxic overworking culture, starting with our judgement of ourselves. I’m not saying that classes should necessarily be easier. I’m simply saying that we shouldn’t take pulling all-nighters, stress crying, and unhealthy coping mechanisms as the norm. We shouldn’t be okay with working ourselves to death. We should take care of each other and encourage ourselves to break these unhealthy habits instead of continuing to joke about these things.Good mental health is one of the most valuable things you can have. It’s often taken for granted, but it really does matter and we should talk more about these issues in all departments. There’s a cycle here that needs to be broken, and breaking it can begin with us. *A Brown-student-centered Facebook page that posts anonymous submissionsImage via.