December 10, 2025 | GradWell Season 2 View transcript ⚠️ JavaScript is required to view the podcast player. Guest Elizabeth Rohr is the Well-Being Advocate and senior manager of the Well-Being Advocate Program of the Rackham Graduate School, partnering with Rackham graduate program faculty, staff, and students to identify and address structural issues that impact graduate student mental health and well-being. Elizabeth is a graduate of the University of Michigan School of Social Work, with an emphasis in interpersonal practice and mental health. She also holds a BS in Sociology with a minor in History from Northwestern University. Elizabeth has had an eclectic professional journey. She’s worked in the private sector as a corporate project and event manager; was a Public Allies Americorp member in Chicago working with HIV+ women and children, an intimate partner and sexual violence prevention peer educator in San Francisco, and helped conduct research and develop new programs for nontraditional graduate students at the Center for the Education of Women (CEW+) here at U-M. Prior to joining Rackham, she worked directly with undergraduate students to develop their mindful leadership skills at the LSA Barger Leadership Institute for 5 years. Resources Resources on the Graduate Advisor Relationship Resources on Cultivating a Sense of Belonging Michigan Doctoral Experience Survey Transition Points: Well-being and Disciplinary Identity in the First Years of Doctoral Studies – Paper based on Michigan Doctoral Experience Survey Okanagan Charter: An International Charter for Health Promoting Universities & Colleges Well-Being Collective Reach out to Elizabeth with any questions: [email protected] Email us about the podcast: [email protected] Stay in touch by joining Gradwell’s MCommunity group! Transcript Sam Hobson: Hey, welcome to GradWell, a limited series podcast that explores various ways the University of Michigan can support its graduate students and their journey to create a well-being in our everyday lives, brought to you by Rackham Graduate School. This season, we’ll be talking to members of our academic community whose research intersects various dimensions of well-being. I’m Sam Hobson, a PhD candidate and a GSSA in Rackham’s professional development and engagement office. My fellow grad students, it’s time we start placing as much importance on ourselves as we do our work. You’re worth the effort. Elizabeth Rohr: It’s really ensuring that everyone involved in the production, the creation, the support of graduate students and graduate education are taken care of. Sam Hobson: Hello, hello. Today’s resource is Elizabeth Rohr, Rackham’s well-being advocate. Today, we’re going to be discussing the landscape of graduate well-being, where we are, how far we’ve come, and where we go from here. I am super excited to have y’all with Elizabeth and me today. All right, let’s jump in. So Elizabeth Rohr used to be one of us. She’s a graduate of Michigan’s School of Social Work and is currently the well-being advocate and senior manager of the Well-being Advocate Program of the Rackham Graduate School. She partners with Rackham faculty, staff, and students to identify and address structural issues that impact graduate student mental health and well-being. Elizabeth has had an eclectic professional journey. She’s worked in the private sector as a corporate project and event manager. She was a Public Allies AmeriCorps member in Chicago working with HIV+ women and children, and she was an intimate partner in sexual violence prevention peer educator in San Francisco. She helped conduct research and develop new programs for non-traditional graduate students at CEW+ here at Michigan. And prior to joining Rackham, she worked directly with undergrads to develop their mindful leadership skills at the LSA Barger Leadership Institute. Elizabeth, thank you- Elizabeth Rohr: Hello. Sam Hobson: … for being here with me today. So as the senior manager of the Rackham Well-being Program, what do you do? What is the Rackham Well-being Program? Elizabeth Rohr: Very good question and always the question that folks ask. As you mentioned in the introduction, a lot of what I do, most of what I do is work directly with graduate programs versus working directly with graduate students. And the reason this is, is back in 2022, the University of Michigan signed on to something known as the Okanagan Charter, which was really a kind of innovative approach to embedding health promoting resources, activities, programs, policies, structures at higher education institutions. And part of that work, again, is to really think about health promotion at a high level, where the impacts really can be felt, and it’s usually kind of systems level. And so when the Okanagan Charter was adopted by the university, a lot of the departments and unit schools and colleges were thinking about how they could do some of that work in their own kind of backyard. And so Rackham created this position. And again, not to work directly with graduate students, but to really think about how the structures of graduate education can impact both negatively and positively can impact the well-being of graduate students. And so to do that, working directly with graduate programs to make those systemic changes. And that usually means I work with graduate program faculty, certainly program leadership, so directors of graduate studies, graduate chairs. I’m also really lucky to be able to work with graduate program staff and graduate students. That’s part of the advocate program is that we involve all voices in the graduate program-level discussions. Sam Hobson: And so you say that your emphasis is on how programs are structured and then how that then can affect and influence graduate students’ mental health and well-being. Elizabeth Rohr: Right. Sam Hobson: What have you found to be the case? You said that it can be structured both positively and negatively towards well-being. Elizabeth Rohr: Right. The program was a pilot program. The Well-being Advocate Program was a pilot program beginning in 2022, and we just really finished the pilot phase. And what we learned in the three plus years was that there are really five key components in graduate programs. And this is something that the data kind of bears out or doesn’t kind of, does bear out that in graduate programs, students are impacted. And again, when I say negatively or positively, it means that these things that are parts of programs, some of them are just part of a program. And there is neither a good or bad piece to it. It’s just that they are. It’s that when there isn’t, say there isn’t a level of communication or support or awareness or recognition around the thing, then they can have more negative impacts on students. But when there is more positive supports, maybe I’ll use an example here of mentoring advising. We know from the research that mentors and advisors in graduate school, particularly in doctoral programs, are really key to positive outcomes for students, particularly well-being outcomes. However, if a student has an advisor or mentor that doesn’t offer the level of support or guidance or the resources, whatever it might be, whatever in that relationship that a student might need to thrive, then we consider that a more negative impact. There’s a negative impact on well-being. But the opposite can be said, there’s lots of students who have supportive mentors, advisors. I know you talked to another guest on your podcast about this particular relationship, but when you have positive relationships, those then outcomes are more positive. So well-being outcomes in the research that we see are higher for that very reason. So that’s what I mean by positive, negative. It’s that these things that are not necessarily immutable, but they’re there, they exist. And depending on how a program recognizes and addresses them, they can have either positive or negative impacts on students. Sam Hobson: Okay. So I’m understanding that the graduate programs have particular features that are requirements in order to exist as a graduate program, right? One of them being mentorship and advising. And yeah, like you said, in the first episode, we spoke with Dorian Bobbitt, who does research on graduate advising relationships and how important they are. And it’s not necessarily, “Oh, this is a positive experience,” but also it’s not necessarily like this is, oh, a negative experience. It’s just simply how that manifests. And it can manifest differently across departments, within departments, because A, we’re dealing with human beings and human beings are all wonderfully unique. But also, as Dorian mentioned in our first episode, there is no systematic structure to how they manifest. And so each department does it differently. Each person does it differently, particularly because as Dorian said, there’s the very little training involved in it. And so we’re relying on people’s guesses in terms of how to be a good mentor. And that on top of all of the things that our professors have to do feels like a big ask. And so I can understand that the mentor advisor relationship is a fundamental aspect of what it means to experience graduate school. And that aspect of it, that future has an effect on well-being. That is the relationship, but the positive or negative sort of flavor of that influence varies so widely. And I don’t think we talk about that enough. Elizabeth Rohr: Right. And there’s many features of graduate school I think that have similar positive, negative potential outcomes. And that’s really… When I work with graduate programs, I kind of approach the relationship because sometimes it can be a longer term relationship. It can be a year, a full academic year. And so part of it is to approach it from a strengths-based perspective, which is that inherently graduate programs, they’re not bad. There’s features that, again, depending on how those features are implemented, and maybe implement is not the right word, but a feature like mentoring advising, depending on the relationship or the type of advising or the training, depending on what goes into that particular relationship, it can have a positive impact or a negative impact. That’s also true for something like sense of belonging. So when a student enters into a program, the communication they receive, the expectations that they have, how they come into a program and how they are supported in that entry point, at that entry point and into the program and throughout their first year, that is also something that is maybe neither negative or positive. but again, really programs have, in some cases with that, have some power and some agency about how to create a more supportive environment in which students feel that sense of belonging. So again, it’s really empowering programs to see that there are these areas in their programs that they do have some agency over and that do have impacts on students and in some cases, and in many cases, have negative impacts on students. So it really is giving programs the data that they need, the information, suggested best practices, and allowing them to choose the pathway and the best way to support their students. Because as you said earlier, programs are different, disciplines are different, program culture is different, the experience is different. And so we try not to take a one size fits all. And that’s why we talk about best practices, but a best practice for a psychology department versus an engineering department might be completely different based on the students, based on student identities, based on studies. All of that stuff is … it’s a complicated mix of things in this program, in the advocate program that we’re kind of balancing when we work with programs. Sam Hobson: The first thing that really jumped out at me … Well, first, actually, is that we also had an episode on belonging. And so I think that’s really cool that as for this final episode of the season, we seem to be doing a recap. And so that feels aligned. But the first thing that I’m quite interested in is that graduate experience is not monolithic. And I think we often seem to treat it as such. Like you said, the culture of a psychology department and what it needs is so different than the culture of an engineering department and what it needs. And I feel like, again, that’s not necessarily talked about often in terms of the nuance and the variation within the one experience of being a graduate student, in that we can’t ask for the same things in different places. And I think oftentimes perhaps it’s not necessarily communicated, but there are assumptions that a wide swath can be placed onto how we make change. And what I’m hearing from you is no, it needs to be so much more tailored to the lived experience of this particular culture. And we can’t say that we know what a culture needs without really getting in there and talking to people and understanding structurally how this culture manifests. Yeah. Elizabeth Rohr: A lot of this work, of course, is not uniform. And as I said, for the most part, there aren’t any one size fits all. But what we do have, which is really helpful, is a lot of data that’s been generated at the Rackham level through the Michigan Doctoral Experience Survey, which is a longitudinal study that was launched in 2017. And so every year that survey is administered, so a new cohort starts and every year after they take the survey, you yourself may have taken the survey. But what it does show is that there are things that are shared across disciplines, across programs, but primarily across disciplines, because that’s really what’s being looked at. And from there, you can take that kind of generalized, being very careful about this, very generalized data, and you can bring it to a program and say, “Okay, this is kind of what we know. So what’s happening in your program?” Then your program, this thing might not be as pronounced as this thing, but we know we have some pathways. So at least we have some general ways in which to start conversations with programs. And that’s when the kind of customizable, maybe not the right word, but the features that are unique to that program, really that’s when we start to do that work. But we have some generalized information. So again, it’s really interesting, really sometimes challenging work, but starting from a place where you know that the folks that you’re working with are interested in change, that’s why they’re there, that’s why they’re doing the work, that makes all the difference. And it has been my experience over the last four years that that’s the commonality with all of these programs, no matter what discipline they’re in, what division they’re in, that they’re all there because they’re interested in supporting their students. They want to hear their students’ voices. It’s not always that simple, and it certainly isn’t without its complications, but it gives me a sense of hope that that really exists, that level of compassion is there. Sam Hobson: Yes. It gives me that sense of hope as well. It feels nice to hear, particularly sitting on this side of the table, it may not always feel that way. And so to hear that reminder feels good. It feels good. What I really like about the work that you do, and also just the way that you described your work is that if the graduate program has a number of features and these features have been proven to or demonstrated to have a positive or negative impact on graduate well-being, then it sounds like there are mechanisms by which we can activate positive graduate well-being. Do you know what I mean? That feels really, again, hopeful that here are things that if we figure out how to do them well for your students, will generate a positive well-being and positive mental health within your graduate student population. And so yeah, that feels … I did not really understand it as that before this conversation. Yeah. So how have you seen the attention on graduate student well-being shift between now and when you started this work four years ago? Elizabeth Rohr: Well, at the symposium, I’ll start by answering this question by talking about the final conversation that was had at the symposium, which featured four folks in various spaces at the university. We had a faculty member from EEB, Environmental and Evolutionary Biology. We had the chief mental health officer. I think we had the director of Wolverine Wellness, and we had a former doctoral student who’s now an associate professor at Temple. They all came and talked about this very question, which is when they started, because they were all very instrumental in bringing graduate students and graduate student mental health to the forefront, because up until that point, there were conversations certainly about mental health, student mental health, but I think graduate students, again, there are similarities between undergrad and graduate students. There’s stressors, there’s demands. Education, particularly at Michigan is rigorous and tough, but graduate education has different layers of toughness. And so those pieces were sort of being overlooked. And so I think about when I started and when they started really kind of bringing attention to the unique features of graduate education and the stressors that graduate students live with every day. And again, not just in their programs, but by virtue of being a graduate student, there’s external pressures, there’s financial, there’s all of these other things. So I’ve continued to see the level of awareness grow and the interest in really focusing specifically on graduate students, on creating resources, creating research around graduate students in particular. Again, there’s a lot of focus on student mental health, but there continues to be a growing number of researchers, practitioners that are focused specifically on graduate student mental health and well-being, and more importantly, on holistic well-being. So looking at how well-being is interconnected, how all of the pieces, the dimensions of well-being are interconnected. And I think that’s really important because focusing on mental health is extremely important and that ties in with all of the other pieces, but not looking at all of the other pieces as equally important or influential or informing each other, I think sometimes leaves out lots of different ways that you can support students and support graduate students. That level of interest and awareness and engagement around the dimensions, the holistic piece is really, I’ve seen grow exponentially. Sam Hobson: I’m really glad to hear that the interest has grown. What do you think is the reason? Do you think that in general in our sort of public imaginary, we have been talking more about mental health as a culture, and that has then inevitably sort of trickled down, if you will, to the specific experience of graduate students. Or do you think that the experience of graduateness, graduate programs, have things gotten more stressful and difficult or are people becoming more aware, cognizant? Do they just care more about the experience of graduate students than perhaps they did a decade ago? Elizabeth Rohr: Well, I think, so this is based on observation, like my own and in my own opinion. So this isn’t necessarily based in any solid research, but what I have seen in the work that I’ve done over the last four years, I’ve seen higher education in more than four years, because prior to this, I was spent five years at the Barger Leadership Institute working with undergraduate students. So I have seen a level of awareness and compassion kind of creep into, sounds bad, but grow. I’ve seen that grow within higher education, meaning that there seems to be an awareness that going to college is hard. It’s a period of huge transitions for the folks that are doing it, for a variety of reasons. And those same transitions occur and those same challenges occur between undergraduate and graduate school as well. And so finding ways to bring more flexibility, bring different perspectives, think about things like universal design, like accessibility, like all of these things we’ve been really thinking about and really implementing in undergraduate education, but our undergraduate students are going to graduate school. And so they’re bringing that same level of expectation, that same hope of flexibility, that same idea that one might need accommodations, one might need different types of accessibility, that they’re bringing those expectations into their graduate experience as well. And graduate education, I think admittedly so, has always been a different, as you know as a student, that the expectations of the rigor, the demands of it, I mean, all of those are different than that of an undergraduate student. And so I think that because the student expectations may be shifting, I think that that’s perhaps why some of the kind of awareness and focus on graduate student well-being is now there and there in a way that it wasn’t even a decade ago. But that’s me sort of just thinking about what it’s like to be an undergraduate student and then suddenly you find yourself in a completely different environment in which you only are in courses for maybe a year and then you have research. It’s a very different environment and not supported in the same way. It doesn’t mean it’s not supported. It just means it’s not supported in the same way that maybe folks were used to in undergrad. And so I think that people are not only aware of it, but then are questioning, “Well, why does it have to be this way? Why does it have to be hard like this? Why can’t it be more flexible? Why can’t we have these things?” And again, those questions are neither good nor bad. They’re just questions of curiosity. I’m coming into this and I’m asking, why is this so hard? And I don’t have the answers for that. And again, I don’t have any particular judgment about it. It’s just, that’s kind of my observation. And I think that that will, as long as students are bringing awareness and a sense of agency into their lives as students, I think those questions will persist. And I think the level of awareness and attention on graduate well-being will remain. Sam Hobson: That is so very interesting that students are bringing in expectations and these expectations are an impetus for change at the graduate level, but these expectations came from change that occurred at the undergraduate level from the institution side. And so it’s like chicken and egg sort of in terms … Yeah, that’s really interesting. Elizabeth Rohr: Yeah. And again, that’s observation. That is not born out of any type of research. It’s just in working with undergraduate students and supervising those students and really listening to their experiences in class and with their professors and then doing the same thing in the graduate school. I’m like, oh, it’s sort of like, “Oh, I can see how that could be a challenge when you are going directly say from undergraduate into graduate school.” It’s a completely different culture and it’s one in which I think it’s harder to prepare for. And I think there’s a lot of assumptions about graduate school that if you’re there, you’re ready for all of the things that come with it. And I’m not sure that everybody is fully prepared for that. Sam Hobson: I think you have a particularly keen insight having worked with undergraduates and then graduates after, to understand, like you said, this shift, this transition that others might not necessarily have that perspective. So yeah, I buy it. I totally do. Elizabeth Rohr: Good. Let’s do the research. That’s next. Sam Hobson: Okay. So speaking of research, you mentioned earlier the Michigan Doctoral Experience Study and three Michigan researchers published a paper a few years ago that analyzed the data that was collected from this longitudinal study. And we’ll link that in the resources for anybody interested. So their paper described a number of key factors that contribute to graduate student well-being, like we talked about, including stress, competence and relatedness, and unmet needs for autonomy, among others. Elizabeth Rohr: Right. Sam Hobson: How does the Well-being Advocate Program address these stress factors? Are there specific interventions that you have found to be effective? Elizabeth Rohr: I would say that, again, because no one intervention kind of fits all, but some very general things that do seem to address or at least answer some of the stressors or the conditions that can lead to the stressors or the stress of graduate school. And I just mentioned earlier just a few minutes ago about expectations. We have a lot of conversations with programs often about the kind of misalignment of program expectation versus a student expectation around a particular thing. And so students might understand a particular thing to be this, to be A, whereas a program understands it to be A and B. And so clear communication from the program to students, and not just clear communication once, but aligning the communication mode. So is it in the student handbook? Is it on the website? Is it something that comes up when a student meets with their advisor? Is it something that they learn in orientation? Do they get reminders of it? And I know it sounds excessive, but often, especially with big things, because there’s so many big and small things in graduate school that I think graduate students in their first year are trying to sort of balance that reminders, clear communication and consistent communication is one of the biggest pieces for better outcomes for students. It doesn’t change the fact. So knowing about your prelim exam, knowing when it’s happening, knowing why it’s happening, knowing generally what will be a part of the prelim, what the structure of it will be, all of those things help allay some of the stress, the unknowns. It doesn’t take away the stress of the actual exam. And so when we work with programs, it’s never, “We got to get rid of this whole thing.” It’s like, “Well, what can you do to mitigate some of those stressors?” The stressors that for a lot of us, uncertainty, not knowing something, especially when it’s co-mingled with the stress of the actual thing, of the taking of the exam. So when you take away at least a portion of what the stress is, you are mitigating some of the stress. Again, that’s not a thing that’s going to get rid of all the stress of graduate school, but it is a way that programs … And it’s something within the power of programs too. It’s not something that they have to get additional funding for or they have to hire a new person for. It’s something that programs, if they align all of their communication materials and modalities, they can at least address the lack of communication or transparency or whatever it is that students have named as one of the key components of their stress. I worked with a program that had a really unique … We did a student survey, and on that student survey, communication emerged as a top issue in how students identified impacts on well-being. And so the chair had a really unique solution, which was there were individual emails that would go out at the beginning of each term that would outline kind of, “Hi, first years, this is kind of what you should expect. This is what’s going to happen,” just kind of outlined everything, “Hi, second years.” And really, again, they were kind of customized emails for each cohort, each year cohort. And I thought that was a really unique solution that the program itself generated based on conversations, based on the data from the survey. They were like, “We can do this.” There was an extra step, there was a little more work for the chair, but for them, they felt like this was a way to support student well-being and it was a simple way to do that. Again, that was kind of a unique solution, but it was specific to this particular program. Other programs have used other solutions, other interventions to address things like communication. Sam Hobson: I love this. I really do. I feel like, like you said, we are so focused on the big things, the defense, the prospectus, the transition points, right? Elizabeth Rohr: Yeah. Sam Hobson: But there’s so many days in between those milestones, years often. And there’s so much that can be done in the in between, in those liminal spaces that can really contribute to a much more positive and joyful and peaceful experience of those big transition points, right? Elizabeth Rohr: Yeah, absolutely. Sam Hobson: And I have never really thought about it, but you’re right, this disconnect between expectations and how the uncertainty of a thing, one of these big milestones can contribute or exacerbate the stress that we experience of the milestone itself. I think expectations are quite tricky because we don’t always know that we have them, right? It’s hard to reflect on what we’re assuming about an experience until it surprises us because we don’t get what we thought. Elizabeth Rohr: Yep, exactly. Yeah. Sam Hobson: Right? Elizabeth Rohr: Yeah. Sam Hobson: And so that’s got to be a really tricky and yet sort of fundamental aspect of an experience with a relationship. And we have a relationship with our program, with our department, with our chair, with our colleagues, with our cohort mates, right? Elizabeth Rohr: Right. Sam Hobson: And all of these relationships are riddled with assumptions that we don’t realize that we’re making and those assumptions can harm us or can contribute negatively to our mental well-being. And so yeah, I hear that this is a tall order on your part. Yeah, that’s what I’m hearing, but also just it feels like it can be It’d be a really, really comforting, yummy, delicious, really fulfilling order to fill once you can. Elizabeth Rohr: The approach of the advocate program is both near and kind of long-term. Again, we’re looking at ways to mitigate stressors by also thinking about long-term impacts. We have folks at Rackham who work directly with programs that have the resources and the expertise to make … We want to change our preliminary exam. We want to create a pro seminar. We want to do big work. And so that is part of my role too, is once we get through some of those near-term kind of solutions and they want to do bigger work, it’s like, okay, I’m going to connect you now to other Rackham resources. And we’re going to keep in mind that well-being is part of that work. That well-being is the lens in which this work is being done. Sam Hobson: Elizabeth, I know you just worked incredibly hard to put on your inaugural symposium that explores well-being and graduate education. Can you share what that was about, how it went, and what you learned? Elizabeth Rohr: So in line with all of what we’re talking about, part of the advocate program is I work directly with the Rackham Mental Health and Well-being Standing Committee, which has been in existence now since 2019. That committee is really charged with exploring well-being in graduate education, either through research or practice. And so we started a conversation about creating some sort of forum, which turned out to be in symposium, which to feature, again, some of that research and some of that practice that is out there in the University of Michigan ecosystem. So that was very exciting. It was about a year in the making. The symposium was meant to capture kind of the breadth of work that’s being done at the University of Michigan, and that included the Flint and Dearborn campuses. And so it turns out that we had a really, really diverse set of presenters and presentations. We had panels, we had posters, and really represented the broad strokes of well-being research and practice out there. We had our keynote who came in from Harvard to talk about graduate student well-being as she sees it now, as it is currently, how they’re measuring it and the changes that she’s seen post-COVID, but also some of the assumptions that I think we make about well-being that she found were not as consistent or true anymore, which I thought was really interesting as well. More than anything, what it showed me was that people are very, very interested in graduate education and graduate student well-being, and that there is this real recognition that I think going back to the question you asked some time ago, over the four years, the changes in how people think about graduate students and how graduate student needs and graduate student well-being has shifted remarkably. And that was evident in what people showed up with and the conversations that people had and how they think about graduate students and the assumptions that they made, would have made maybe five years ago or even 10 years ago really are going away in some ways. Again, rethinking what it means to have rigor, what does that mean to well-being? So people are asking these big questions. Nobody is yet in a place to make big, huge changes, but people are having those conversations because they recognize that graduate education is a really unique experience. And for those that want to be a part of it, that go to graduate school, there really is a level of joy and enthusiasm for doing so. And so how do you maintain and retain that for future generations? So people are having these conversations because well-being is at the center of that. It’s not just how are students’ mental health? It is like, how is their relationship to their families? How do they feel about their programs? Are they connecting to their discipline? We’re looking at all of these things that are important to really sustaining graduate education and well-being again, being centered. So that was what I found was the most heartening about the symposium is that for everyone who attended, they’re all really interested in preserving graduate education and strengthening it and really thinking of well-being as a key component of that. Sam Hobson: That sounds wonderful. It really does. I’m so happy for you that a year’s worth of work seemed to really culminate in something that was really fruitful. I really liked how you framed it in terms of sustainability because this experience doesn’t always feel incredibly sustainable. Right. Right. And so like you said, that well-being is just one component or a broader umbrella under which there’s so much nuance for the graduate student experience. And to then start looking at the nuance, those different relationships to the department, to the family, to colleagues, to the institution, to et cetera, et cetera, that go into our experience of well-being in a way that makes this relationship, like you said, a joyful one and a sustainable one that will then want to encourage others to engage in as well. It’s really important. And I think such a nuanced perspective of well-being that I can imagine, yeah, this wouldn’t have been how we spoke about graduate well-being even four years ago. I can imagine that. So yeah, this feels really hopeful. Yeah. Elizabeth Rohr: Yeah. I mean, more than anything, I think despite the fact that the work and not just the work, but again, acknowledging that graduate school, graduate education, it can be really challenging and certainly can be for graduate students, their well-being, for many, it does, and the research bears this out, it really does. There are declines over time in programs. And it’s acknowledging that and recognizing that and not spending lots of time blaming, but really looking for solutions and really bringing programs into that solution-oriented work. And I think that that’s important because those are the folks who are involved day-to-day with the lives of their students, with the courses that they’re teaching, the research, with all of it. And so they have to also be a part of figuring out how to better support their students through this experience, how to get them the things that they need. And in some cases, only they know the best ways to do that along with their students, of course. But I think it is hopeful because it is very much a social work perspective for me, kind of an ethos, which is you empower folks. And if you’re not empowering folks, you are giving them the agency that they need to find their own solutions. And I feel like that this is one of those key places to do that and I’m happy to partner with programs to do that work because that’s what I am. I’m a partner with them. I’m not making them do anything. Again, as I said there, and that to me is hopeful that there is an interest in sustaining these programs and sustaining scholarship and bringing new generations of students into graduate education and seeing them thrive. Sam Hobson: Yes. The thriving. We’ve talked about the thriving. Yep. Yep. A lot this season about, it’s not just about surviving. We really want to thrive while we’re here. And a lot of that takes effort on our part. You’re not going to thrive without intentional effort and activating your own agency to make sure that you thrive. So yeah, I like that. I like that we seem to be collectively shifting our focus to not just getting through, but making sure that we thrive while we do while we’re here. Elizabeth Rohr: Yeah. Sam Hobson: Yeah. Elizabeth Rohr: More joy if possible. Sam Hobson: Yes. More joy, more laughter, more dancing, more singing, more snuggles. All of it. Elizabeth Rohr: That would be the new advocate program like that. More snuggles. I’ll sign off. Yeah. Sam Hobson: Elizabeth, speaking of all of this hope that we’ve been chatting about recently, where do you think the future of graduate well-being is headed? Elizabeth Rohr: Oh, such a big question. What I hope is that there will be continued attention through research, through innovative practices. I mean, one of the things I love about the Well-being Collective, and I really didn’t spend a lot of time talking about them, but the Well-being Collective is the university-level body that is looking at systems and structures as a part of the Okanagan Charter. And so they, again, are really looking at how to embed at a systems level health promotion, well-being for the community, not just for students. Of course, students are our primary focus at higher education institutions, obviously, but for students, faculty and staff. How do you bring the entire community? How do you really embed well-being so that we’re all thriving? And so I think about well-being in graduate education in that space of, we now recognize that it’s not just programs. It’s not just, we’re going to do this thing and it’s going to help this thing in the short-term, that we have that graduate education and graduate well-being, graduate student well-being is really a much more complex kind of holistic task ahead of us. And that if we start looking at systems and structures as a longer-term goal, then we have a real opportunity to, I think, again, as I said, sustain graduate education for the long-term because we will have students that don’t burn out. We will have faculty that don’t get burned. Again, it’s really ensuring that everyone involved in the production, the creation, the support of graduate students and graduate education are taken care of and get the things that they need. And that is really meta and hopeful, but that’s what I think about when I think about it long-term is that people are thinking about systems and structures and they know that there are certain things that need to be fixed or certain things that need to be strengthened. And so I think that there are folks that are coming out of graduate school now and going to the academy are really thinking about those things and they’re thinking about it for their students and they’re thinking about it for the next set of students. And I’ve met a lot of faculty who are really focused on making sure that their students are very successful in all areas as they make their way through their programs. And it’s going to take a lot of time, but I am super hopeful and we probably need more deans like Dean Solomon too to really anchor some of this work at a very structural level. Because that’s, again, when we talk about systems and structures, that’s also where it starts too. You start with leadership in institutions who really embody this idea that well-being is central to the health of an institution and all of its community. Sam Hobson: I totally agree. I really appreciate the interconnectedness that you made note of in terms of that, A, just acknowledging that we are all interconnected as human beings living on earth, right? But that my graduate well-being is not just well-being at the graduate student level. In order to have true graduate well-being, my well-being is interconnected to my faculty’s well-being, to my chair’s well-being, to my administrative staff’s well-being. If their well-being is not well, my well-being isn’t going to be well. And I really, really, really appreciate that perspective. I think that taking a holistic approach is always one that creates more true change. I never thought about it. I never thought about how graduate student well-being cannot only exist at the graduate student level in order to be actualized. Yeah. Elizabeth Rohr: Yeah. Sam Hobson: You’ve got my wheels spinning in terms of how can we not reframe, but how can we shift how we frame graduate well-being in order to incorporate, like you said, our entire community, our entire network, our entire collective of experience, of relationship that is what it means to be a graduate student and to experience graduate education. Yeah, that’s really cool. Elizabeth Rohr: Yeah. Sam Hobson: Elizabeth, do you have anything else you’d like to share before we part ways? Elizabeth Rohr: I’m grateful that you invited me to join your podcast for today and grateful to talk about my program and the work that I’m doing. There’s an element to it that’s not very glamorous, but is certainly genuinely altruistic and hopefully effective. Sam Hobson: Elizabeth, thank you. Thank you not only for being here with us today and sharing your insight, but also for the work that you do, for the very likely invisible work that you do for us as graduate students to make sure that our experience here is as wonderful as it can be. And like you said, I know it’s a slow process, but that’s okay. Elizabeth Rohr: Yeah, it’s okay. Sam Hobson: Thank you. Elizabeth Rohr: Thank you. Sam Hobson: Okay. Here are three takeaways for your well-being journey. One, graduate school in and of itself is not inherently detrimental to our well-being. It depends on how particular aspects manifest. Things like communication, expectations, and advisor relationships are necessary features of the graduate experience that can positively benefit your well-being. But in order to ensure that you receive that positive benefit, it’s important to get very clear on what you need. And as Dr. Molengraff said in episode two, “Ask for it.” Two, graduate student well-being is a complex, holistic experience that includes not just us, but everyone and thing that contributes to the production of the graduate experience. True addressing of grad student well-being means that we also address the well-being of our staff, our faculty, our administrators. Their wellness is ours and ours is theirs. And three, I know this grad student life can feel isolating, but there are a lot of people out there who are really invested in graduate well-being. Work is being done, research is being conducted, questions are being asked. We may not be where we want to be yet, but we’re on our way. Check out our website for resources related to this episode at Rackham.umich.edu/GradWell. You can email Elizabeth with any questions you have at [email protected]. You can contact us about the podcast at [email protected] and make sure to stay tuned. We have some bonus episodes for you next semester. I’ll see you then. Hey, hardworking grad student. Thank you for tuning into GradWell. I hope you can take something away from this episode with you. If you like what you heard, be sure to write a review, like, and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. For more information, check us out on social @umichgradschool.
