NEWS & EVENTS | May 10, 2021
A Screening Project to Better Serve Students
Danielle de Moissac, researcher and professor, will be developing a screening program to better support new students.
A two-year grant totalling $39,982 from the Consortium national de formation en santé (CNFS) will allow USB researcher Danielle de Moissac to launch a new project entitled Validation d’un programme de dépistage et d’aiguillage des étudiants à risque en milieu postsecondaire francophone en contexte minoritaire [Validation of a screening and referral program for at-risk students in a postsecondary francophone setting in a minority context], which includes the development of a screening program that uses a questionnaire for students entering their first year of postsecondary studies.
“With this program, we hope to find out in advance if new students will need academic, psychological or socioeconomic support, so that we can better refer them to the appropriate services,” explains Danielle de Moissac, who will work in conjunction with statistician Ndeye Rokhaya Gueye, Director of Student Services Christian Perron, as well as researchers from the University of Regina (UR) and the Université de Hearst (UH).
The screening tool will be offered to future students from the three collaborating universities, and participation will be voluntary.
“With this new more proactive, structured and personalized approach, we will be able to suggest to those in need the most appropriate support services available within their university, from the moment they start their university career. Focusing on prevention in mental health allows us to avoid long-term problems.”
The principal researcher is also thrilled about the benefits of such a program for service providers. “This project will also help enhance our services at USB to better respond to our students’ needs.”
The team hopes to administer the screening questionnaire at the start of the academic year in September 2021 so that they can begin gathering and analyzing the data as soon as possible.