With the rapid development of society, college students are facing the dual pressure of study and employment, which leads to an endless stream of mental health problems, and has become the focus of society, schools and families. Therefore, it is particularly important to do a good job in college students’ mental health education. College counselors are good teachers and good friends of students. They play an important guiding role in college students’ mental health education. They play an important role in improving students’ personality and mental health. This paper analyzes the advantages of college students’ psychological health education, and puts forward the effective participation strategies of college Students’ psychological health education.

The application of positive psychology in the work of mental health education in colleges and universities can help students better face setbacks, enable students to face learning and life with a positive attitude, and promote students' future development and promote students' healthy growth. Based on positive psychology, this paper analyzes and discusses its practice and exploration in college students' mental health education.

To address gaps in practical skills among Public Health and Preventive Medicine graduates, an ‘open collaborative practice teaching model’ integrating medicine, teaching, and research was introduced. A cross-sectional study surveyed 312 Preventive Medicine undergraduates at a Yunnan medical university from 2020 to 2023, utilizing satisfaction scores and analyses (cluster, factor, SWOT) to assess the impact of the reform. Satisfaction scores from baseline, mid-term, and end-term assessments showed minor variations (4.30, 4.29, 4.36), with dissatisfaction primarily related to teaching content and methods. Key influences on satisfaction included teaching content, methods, and effectiveness. The SWOT analysis highlighted the importance of continuously updating teaching strategies to meet changing student expectations. This study suggests that the model has the potential for wider use in enhancing public health education, particularly in regions facing similar challenges.

In higher education, mental health education is a complex task that involves many educational factors. From the perspective of psychological education, the basic tasks and value pursuits of university mental health education and curriculum ideological and political education are the same. Both are student-centered, providing a basic guarantee for the integration of the two. Currently, some universities are facing issues such as the need to clarify the concept of "psychological education", the trend towards value neutrality in mental health education, and the need to improve the quality of the psychological education team. In response to this situation, universities should integrate educational factors, provide clear value guidance, strengthen integrated education, improve the overall quality of the education team, continue to promote the ideological and political construction of psychological health education courses in universities, and achieve new breakthroughs.