Medical Associations Call for More Resources to Address Youth Mental Health Crisis
Emergency rooms nationwide are seeing an influx of children and teens experiencing mental health crises, a problem which has worsened since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. Three medical associations have issued a policy statement alerting public attention to the problem and calling for more support and resources. According to the paper, limited resources in the community have led to emergency rooms becoming a safety net for families seeking mental health care. Doctors say that emergency rooms are not set up to handle this type of care and “already have challenges with being understaffed and under-resourced.” “The scope of this problem is really great,” said Dr. Mohsen Saidinejad, a professor of emergency medicine and pediatrics at the David Geffen School of Medicine at the University of California, Los Angeles and lead author of the report. “But our ability to solve it is not there.”
The policy statement, published jointly by the American Academy of Pediatrics, the American College of Emergency Physicians, and the Emergency Nurses Association listed several recommendations including: develop school-based screening and trainings for staff on how to recognize mental and behavioral issues related to children and youth; expand the use of telehealth to identify and divert low-acuity patients; and advocate for the expansion of community-based behavioral services.
From LearningWell
In a Q&A with LearningWell, Dr. Marcus Hotaling, President of the Association for University and College Counseling Center Directors (AUCCCD), discusses the group’s recent policy paper “Navigating a Path Forward for Mental Health Services in Higher Education.” Dr. Hotaling describes a moment of crisis, as rates of mental health concerns and help-seeking among students remain high, while counselors are burning out and leaving the field. He stresses the importance of creating and aligning on an action plan for addressing student mental wellbeing. “Do the planning, take the initiative to sit down with your leadership and say, “What can I do? What do you want? What does this school want to offer?’” he said. “And we will work around that with the current staff. And maybe we’ll need to grow staff in the future.”
Mental and Behavioral Health
In an op-ed for Scientific American, Dr. Steven Berkowitz, a professor of psychiatry at University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus, highlights the insufficient number of mental health providers to meet the demands of the ongoing crisis among young people. Since it was declared a national emergency in October 2021, Dr. Berkowitz asserts, the child mental health crisis has only grown more dire, as an already overwhelmed mental healthcare system struggles to keep up with an increasing rate of hospitalizations among young patients. Dr. Berkowitz cites a shortage of child and adolescent psychiatrists, the high cost of treatment, social media use, and difficult relationships with peers and caregivers as contributing factors to the crisis.
The Hill addresses four possible reasons for higher reported stress levels among college women than men, as illuminated by new survey data from Gallup. Experts posit that the gap may be due to the burden of familial and caregiving responsibilities, also listing gender-based discrimination, sexual harassment and assault as potential stressors. According to Brent Maximin, a lecturer in psychology at The City College of New York, women are also more likely to use coping mechanisms such as rumination, which contributes to overall stress. Other scholars, such as B. Sue Graves, an associate professor at Florida Atlantic University, suggest that college-aged women and men may experience similar levels of stress, with women being more likely to report distress than their male peers.
Inside Higher Ed reports on a new survey finding that more than half of students are not getting sufficient sleep, and highlights some ways that colleges and universities are educating students and promoting healthy sleep habits.
Diversity Equity and Inclusion
In an op-ed in Campus Safety Magazine, Rob Buelow, the general manager of education at Vector Solutions, argues that the Supreme Court decision on affirmative action and the movement to ban DEI programming in higher ed will impact students’ performance, mental wellbeing and safety. He points to research demonstrating that discrimination negatively impacts college completion, academic performance, and mental wellbeing; and that feelings of belonging are linked to improved academic attainment, retention, and mental health.
The New College of Florida, the state’s honors college, has been “embroiled in controversy” since Governor Ron DeSantis appointed new trustees more aligned with conservative thought. It is making news again as the trustees passed a motion directing “the president and staff to take the necessary and proper steps to terminate the gender-studies program, beginning with the 2024 enrollees.” The new board has also fired the former president and eliminated the office that handled diversity, equity, and inclusion programs.
Six community college professors in California have filed a lawsuit alleging that new DEIA policies adopted by the state’s community college system violate professors’ First Amendment rights. According to a complaint filed by the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, the new regulations require community college professors to “reflect DEIA and anti-racist principles” and avoid imposing “curricular trauma” in their teaching.
Higher Ed Dive reports that four states have enacted laws limiting the definition of sex to a permanent category of male or female. According to an August report released by the Movement Advancement Project, which tracks anti-LGBTQ measures, these measures could exclude “transgender people from equal access to public life.” An order in Oklahoma says that any public school, public school district or other agency that collects data for the purpose of complying with anti-discrimination laws, like Title IX, must identify people as either male or female according to biological characteristics.
The Republican-controlled North Carolina legislature overrode Gov. Roy Cooper’s veto of a law limiting transgender athletes’ participation in higher education and K-12 sports. The law prohibits transgender women and girls from competing on academic sports teams that align with their gender identity.
According to The Hechinger Report, over 80 percent of colleges and universities now offer test-optional applications, many of which were implemented at the start of the Covid-19 pandemic. The report argues that, contrary to popular belief, optional testing harms low-income applicants, as affluent students with access to private tutors tend to submit their scores to give their applications a boost, while low-income students are more likely to opt out of testing. Colleges still see those scores, and according to the report, it counts: the 2022 acceptance rate at Boston University, for example, was 25 percent for students who submitted scores and 10 percent for those who did not.
WBUR highlights the THRIVE Scholars program at Amherst College, which brings talented students from low income backgrounds to the school for a six-week “summer academy.” The fully funded program prepares the students to apply to and succeed at the nation’s top colleges and universities.
Massachusetts Senators Edward Markey and Elizabeth Warren and Vermont Senator Bernie have called on Education Secretary Miguel Cardona to end legacy and donor preferences in college admissions, arguing that these preferences are advantageous to white and affluent students at the expense of low-income students and students of color. In the wake of the Supreme Court decision to eliminate race-conscious admissions, the Education Department launched a civil rights inquiry into Harvard’s legacy admissions practices, a decision applauded by the three senators, who now urge Cardona to pursue additional measures toward ending legacy admissions.
Sexual Assault and Title IX
The Chronicle of Higher Ed reports on two defamation lawsuits brought against students speaking out about sexual assault. In one case, an ex-administrator of a small college in Wisconsin is suing a former student for criticizing the school’s handling of sexual assault cases, alleging that she made false statements accusing the administrator of covering up misconduct. In another case, the Connecticut Supreme Court ruled that a student expelled for sexual assault could sue the woman who accused him for defamation. Advocates for sexual-assault victims have decried the ruling, saying it could deter reporting.
Substance Use
According to reports from The Washington Post, recreational drug use among young adults is on the rise. Research conducted by the University of Michigan Institute for Social Research found that marijuana use among young adults reached an all-time high last year. The Monitoring the Future report also found that use of hallucinogens, such as LSD and mushrooms, has increased from 3 percent to 8 percent among adults aged 19-30 in the last decade. Although consumption of alcohol, the most common drug among young adults, has seen a general decline in the last 10 years, binge drinking and high-intensity drinking continue to rise.
Student Success
According to a recent national survey of graduating high school seniors, the three most important ways colleges can help students transition to higher education are financial assistance, academic support programs and mental health services.
A recent survey found that 4 in 10 business leaders believe that recent college graduates are unprepared to enter the workplace, with nearly three quarters pointing to work ethic and communication skills as the reasons. Eighty eight percent said a college course on office ethics would help. In January, an MCI survey of young professionals found that 39% believed that their college did not help them develop skills to prepare them for the emotional or behavioral impact of the transition to the workplace.
College Affordability
The Biden administration’s Saving on a Valuable Education (SAVE) program, which Education Secretary Miquel Cardona called “the most affordable student loan repayment plan ever available,” opened on Tuesday. The repayment program, which is available to more than 20 million borrowers, arrives ahead of student loan payments resuming in October.
The University of Chicago agreed to pay a $13.5 million settlement in a financial aid lawsuit filed in 2022. The lawsuit, which was brought against 16 universities in addition to UChicago, alleges that elite institutions conspired to limit financial aid for admitted students through a consensus approach to need-blind admissions. The lawsuit claims that the 17 accused institutions used shared methodology to limit financial aid and gave preference to the children of donors. The University of Chicago is the first school to settle.
Student loan borrowers express concern as loan repayments are set to resume in October after a three-year pause. Some borrowers have experienced anxiety amid the changing policies and describe their confusion surrounding the Biden administration’s new Saving on a Valuable Education (SAVE) plan, an income-driven plan that will reduce repayment costs based on the borrower’s income and family size.
Reproductive Rights
In an NPR report on California high school graduates who will be attending HBCUs in the South, students consider life under abortion bans. One student, who will be attending Texas Southern University, a historically Black university in a state where abortion is banned, expresses concern that her “newfound freedoms” in the university’s Black community may “come at the expense of another.”
COVID
As colleges and universities enter the 2023-2024 academic year, only a small margin of institutions will continue to mandate Covid-19 vaccines for students. A survey of 311 colleges and universities by the American College Health Association found that only 7.4 percent of institutions have mandatory vaccination policies. While public institutions are subject to state regulations, private institutions have more latitude, leading to greater variation in Covid-19 policies. Claudia Trevor-Wright, director of ACHA’s Campus COVID-19 Vaccine Initiative, asserts that “where there is flexibility, you will see a reflection of the community’s value and ethos.”
