Mental and Behavioral Health
An increase in demand for counseling services at California State University campuses hasn’t been met with a corresponding increase in counselors and that is leading to what campus mental health officials are calling a crisis. Counselors say students with mental health issues might wait weeks or even months for an appointment. A new bill, SB968, would require all California State University and community college campuses to have a ratio of one mental health professional for every 1,500 students. The Press Telegram reports that currently, the ratio at Cal State Long Beach is one counselor for nearly 3,200 students, and that the average wait time to see a counselor at Cal State Long Beach is three weeks.
The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court ruled this week that the Massachusetts Institute of Technology was not negligent and therefore not responsible for the 2009 suicide of a graduate student on its campus. However, the court found colleges and universities do hold some responsibility in protecting students from suicide. The ruling states that though colleges and universities bear some responsibility in protecting their students from harm, “universities are not responsible for monitoring and controlling all aspects of their students’ lives.” A key factor is whether a school could reasonably anticipate harm coming to a student from failing to take steps to protect him or her. The case was closely watched in the higher education community, as a ruling against MIT could have changed the landscape in terms of colleges’ and universities’ responsibility to prevent student suicide.
Two students who reported sexual assaults to the Columbia College Chicago’s Title IX and Counseling Service offices in 2016 say they still feel the effects of those incidents and the school’s failure to help them. One of the students, Madeline Whittemore, who dropped out of Columbia in spring 2017, said the experience was devastating and that Columbia’s handling of the situation contributes to the mental health issues she experiences. One of the problems was insufficient counseling. “If the counseling services could go more in depth, then maybe I would have stayed [at Columbia] or maybe this whole thing wouldn’t have been as traumatic,” Whittemore said.
In the Columbia Chronicle op-ed, the Editorial Board argued that counseling services at the school are not measuring up to students’ needs. The Board wrote, “Columbia students in need of counseling services are cornered into a situation in which they receive little to no support. They potentially have the option of waiting longer than is acceptable to see a counselor… or could put themselves into further debt by seeking, or being told to seek, outside counseling that can cost hundreds of dollars per session. In either scenario, their mental health needs are not addressed and could be made worse by the stress such a difficult situation can cause.”
California State University Los Angeles held its second annual #StigmaFree event to engage students with various issues associated with mental health and stigmatized perception. Activities included a scavenger hunt during which students learned about mental illnesses and the ways that they can eliminate social stigmas. Several organizations participated including The Office for Students with Disabilities, Center for Engagement, Service & The Public Good, The Health Hut and Veterans Resource Center.
University of California Davis students have voiced concerns about wait times, last minute cancellations, and the availability and accessibility of counseling and psychiatric services at the school. Currently, there are 28.5 counselors and 3.5 psychiatrists at UC Davis. According to Assistant Vice Chancellor for Divisional Resources of Student Affairs Cory Vu, having three and a half psychiatrists is “really a luxury” due to the cost of psychiatry. Since holding a Town Hall on Mental Health, changes have been made and there are plans to address student concerns. A case manager has been recently hired with the hopes of reducing the time counselors spend on non-clinical work to free up more time to focus on clinical care. Chancellor, Gary May recently announced the creation of a task force on mental health care.
In the second installment of the series, Stories from CAPS Users: Combating Mental Health Stigma in the Daily Gazette, Nicole Liu investigates how one Chinese international student found their way to counseling at Swarthmore.
According to a new study published in Psychological Reports, university students experienced a significant increase in anger, fear, marginalization, and stress on the day after the 2016 election. Their sleep quality also suffered. The participants also reported an upsurge of race, gender, or age discrimination.
Susan MacQuiddy, the Director of Counseling Services at the Colorado State University Health Network wrote a letter to the Editor of the Rocky Mountain Collegian in response to an opinion piece written by a student encouraging other students to look outside of the CSU Health Network for mental health resources. The letter was meant to make students aware that Counseling Services hear their concerns, and to provide more context around wait times and scheduling. Macquiddy wrote, “We are always looking for innovative ways to use our resources to meet the evolving needs of our students. Over the last few years, we have taken action to improve student access to resources, including increasing the availability of staff for immediate drop-in services, expanding our after-hours availability, offering a wider variety of groups and workshops to meet the diverse needs of our students, expanding our outreach efforts in partnership with Health Education and Prevention Services (HEPS) and Student Diversity Programs and Services (SDPS), and offering more appointments at the end of the semester designed to help students manage added distress and demands.”
A group of Penn State students have started an effort to reach more minority students in health services. The Minority Health Initiative was created to educate students on the resources available to them by HealthWorks and to provide them with a safe place to talk about unique issues and concerns. “Minority students don’t always use these resources or feel they are being represented,” said Dejah Harley, a senior biobehavioral health major, and co-creator of the initiative.
Diversity and Inclusion
Some students are asking to change a longtime nickname for George Washington University, arguing that “Colonials” is offensive because it is too evocative of colonization and oppression. As alternatives, they suggested “Hippos.” Or “Riverhorses.” A Change.org petition states, “We, as students, faculty, and staff of the George Washington University, believe it is of great exigence that the university changes the official nickname for its affiliates. The use of ‘Colonials,’ no matter how innocent the intention, is received as extremely offensive by not only affiliates of the university, but the nation and world at large. The historically, negatively charged figure of Colonials has too deep a connection to colonization and glorifies the act of systemic oppression.”
Colorado State University President Tony Frank apologized for an incident that occurred on a campus tour, when the mother of a prospective student called the police on two Native American student visitors because she believed they were suspicious. “They just really stand out,” she told police, due to their “odd” behavior and clothing with “weird symbolism or wording on it.” She added that one of them is “for sure” Hispanic because he said he’s from Mexico. President Frank wrote in the apology, “Two young men, through no fault of their own, wound up frightened and humiliated because another campus visitor was concerned about their clothes and overall demeanor, which appears to have simply been shyness. The very idea that someone – anyone – might “look” like they don’t belong on a CSU Admissions tour is anathema. People of all races, gender, identities, orientations, cultures, religion, heritages, and appearances belong here.”
Sexual Assault and Title IX
Some colleges are experimenting with strategies that they hope will reduce harmful male behaviors. At least one metric seems to be improving: men’s on-time graduation rates. On a growing number of campuses, student-affairs professionals are drawing on years of research that shows that distorted cultural notions of masculinity skew the development of male students, leading them to be disruptive, threatening, self-harming, and sometimes dangerous.
University of Texas Austin is the latest university to find itself in the cross hairs of critics over “masculinity” programs that seek to expand definitions of male identity and prevent sexual assaults. The new MasulinUT program is housed in the university’s counseling and mental-health office, which drew the ire of conservative publications, which are reporting that the school considers masculinity a mental health problem. The University of Texas, which says this assertion is unfounded, is now suspending a search for a coordinator and rethinking whether the program’s mission aligns with the university’s goals of reducing sexual violence.
The Washington University “It’s On Us” campaign, modeled after the national initiative and launched last year, is attempting to change the campus culture around sexual assault and get men involved in the process of reducing sexual and relationship violence. Tehya Widmann, the volunteer coordinator for the peer health educator program said, “Small conversations create a big impact. We need all the support we can get to change the campus culture on sexual assault awareness and bystander intervention, and that’s what the ‘It’s On Us’ campaign is hoping to achieve.”
Substance Use
While the opioid epidemic continues to ravage communities across the U.S., colleges largely have been spared by the crisis so far. While the opioid epidemic is often called the “equal opportunity” crisis, it does discriminate in terms of education, as it disproportionately affects poorer, more rural and less educated communities.
Hunger and Homelessness
Brown University students with the greatest financial need will now receive additional scholarship funds to cover the full cost of meals, beginning in 2018-2019. Additionally, the university will run a one-year pilot program to cover textbook costs for first-year undergraduates whose parents do not contribute to tuition.
Free Speech
National Public Radio’s This American Life partnered with the Chronicle of Higher Education to produce a podcast story about the political moment playing out on college campuses between conservative and liberal students fighting for free speech. The story highlights an incident at the University of Nebraska where one skirmish spun out of control.
A new report on free speech commissioned by the University of California Berkeley Chancellor, Carol Christ recommends that student groups that want to hold an event may have to explain why and provide volunteer monitors to deal with any resulting unruliness. The report follows a year of repeated chaos at the university over conservative speakers.
A Confederate monument at University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill known as Silent Sam was doused in blood and red ink by Maya Little, a second-year doctoral student in history who is part of a core group of activists calling for the statue’s removal. The Chronicle interviewed Little, who was charged with defacing a public monument, about the symbolism of her protest.
Nine months after a rally by white nationalists in Charlottesville turned violent, the University of Virginia has announced a set of rules for people unaffiliated with the school who want to reserve space to give speeches or hand out information. “The University of Virginia is committed to the Constitutional principle of free speech and to the safety and security of every member of this community,” Teresa Sullivan, the university’s president, wrote Friday.
College Affordability
Congress designated $5 million in the fiscal 2018 budget to support the creation or expansion of open-educational resources: peer-reviewed academic material released under an intellectual property license that permits free use. Sen. Richard J. Durbin (D-Ill.) who sponsored the legislation that prompted the financial support, said in a statement to the Washington Post, “If implemented properly by the Department of Education, this $5 million investment will save college students across the country millions of dollars. I hope they will not squander this golden opportunity to make college more affordable. I’m encouraged by what we’ve heard from the department so far, but I’ll be watching and so will students across America.”
Maryland is set to become the latest state to cover the cost of community college tuition for its residents, as Governor Larry Hogan plans to sign into law a measure ushering in the program.
