Mind Your Health and GEMS Founders School, Dubai

Mind Your Health doesn’t just have a list of courses to choose from. We work with our schools to ensure they get the service and courses they need, according to their circumstances.

We’ve been working with GEMS Founders School in Dubai since 2022. This is their story.

‘George has taken our insights and feedback about some of the content we can’t use in the Senior Mental Health Lead in International Settings course and is now running one specifically for the Middle East. We are proud to be one of the early adopters and the first cohort.’

Why did they need our help?

When Kathryn King, Senior Assistant Principal of GEMS Founders School in Dubai, needed a recommendation for a high-quality mental health provider in 2022, she reached out to a consultant the school was working with. They told her to speak to George Peterkin as Mind Your Health provided insightful, engaging training that offered great value for money too. It was during a phase of the COVID pandemic when in-person training was allowed, but many providers were sticking to online provision only.

As the world was coming out of these periods of lockdown and people were navigating the impact on mental health, Kathryn felt the school needed some additional help in this area. She got in touch with George and was impressed enough to sign up some of her staff for a Mental Health First Aid course. A young person’s version, Warrior®: Mental Health Awareness, was also put on for some of the 16–17-year-old students.

What did Mind Your Health do?

George was able to deliver all the mental health first aid courses GEMS Founders School initially booked in person. The school had offered some online mental health training provision during lockdown but it was felt that, given the opportunity to offer in-person courses going forward, it was important to do so. Courses around mental health can be challenging – both for the provider to make them engaging, and for participants to deal with emotionally. For GEMS Founders School, it was vital that staff and students were able to spend this time with others in a supportive environment should they have any concerns, reflections, or questions to share – rather than alone, online.

Kathryn felt the older students needed guidance and has been pleased to find a strong demand for the Mental Health First Aid and Warrior®: Mental Health Awareness courses. Students must make a case for participating and be accepted onto the course. They are all keen and engaged in the learning opportunities and go through a rigorous safeguarding process. Once a school year group that has received this training leaves the school, students in the year below receive the same training.

The Senior Mental Health Lead in International Settings course is currently only offered online and some of the original content is more difficult to approach in the Middle East. For this reason, George took Kathryn’s feedback on board and was able to tailor the course specifically for participants in the region.

‘We like how sensitively George approaches all these difficult subjects, particularly with the students.’

With the original course only a mandatory requirement in the UK (and not recognised in the Gulf region), Kathryn describes this Mind Your Health course as a ‘golden nugget’ for the school.

What have the benefits of working with Mind Your Health been?

Both the staff and students have benefited from taking part in various Mind Your Health courses. Kathryn feels that George’s background as a teacher helps him plan more effectively to retain the participants’ interest, whether they are staff or students. Working with Mind Your Health has given GEMS Founders Schools new ideas and opportunities to open up the ways they can approach the subject. This includes using artwork to express feelings and discussing anonymous real-life examples.

‘Other providers have been good at getting the message across, but we have found that Mind Your Health’s approach is particularly engaging.’

For Kathryn personally, the upside was in feeling empowered to have certain conversations and to know how to handle them better.

‘The courses have particularly helped on a professional level. I’m much more aware of what to say and what not to say now – and how you can do further harm if you say the wrong thing. Even people with less experience of the impact poor mental health can have on an individual said they had gained a deeper understanding of the issues at play’.

What the future holds

Going forward, GEMS Founders School, Dubai intends to roll out these courses and other mental health training provision by Mind Your Health to the wider school community. The Senior Assistant Principal wants more staff and students to have access to these resources and plans to implement them on a yearly basis.

As for whether Kathryn would be happy to recommend Mind Your Health and their courses, she says she has ‘already recommended them to three other schools’ and would happily recommend George and his team to others.

We are very proud of the work Mind Your Health and GEMS Founders School are doing together. And, as one of the first international schools to receive Mind Your Health’s Pioneer for Mental Health & Wellbeing Award, GEMS Founders School really is leading the way in mental health provision for their staff and students.