Resilience definition: ‘The capacity to recover quickly from difficulties.’

Our Resilience Workshop was created as a result of our Listening Project which highlighted the amazing strength and resilience of people during the Covid-19 pandemic. We were struck by people’s positive attitudes through challenging times and felt that there was a unique opportunity to use their experiences of resilience and our expertise and community insights to create something to support others.

We discussed our thoughts with academic colleagues at the Peninsula Dental School who recognised the value of developing our idea into reality and asked us to design an activity that was relevant and meaningful for students studying in the Faculty of Health at University of Plymouth; helping them to recognise the importance of developing and building on their resilient thinking.

Working with them, an engaging and interactive workshop has been created for 1st Year Dental and Dental Hygiene Therapy students.  A combination of discussion groups, problem solving scenarios and personal stories are used to help students identify how they can positively develop their personal behaviours and attitudes.

The workshop is a fun and enjoyable session with opportunities for students to comment, reflect and ask further questions.  Peninsula Dental School graduates have also supported the development of the session by submitting short video messages reflecting on their experiences as a student and as a practicing dental care professional.

We are delighted that we have received excellent feedback from both the academic team and individual students.