New Issue of the Mary Christie Quarterly
The fall issue of the Mary Christie Quarterly, our journal of ideas, opinion and news on the behavioral health and wellbeing of teens and young adults, is out now. In this issue, we continue our coverage of mental health on campus during a very challenging fall with a variety of different stories and perspectives, including a cover article on the mental health of Black student athletes in 2020, interviews with President Pam Eddinger, of Bunker Hill Community College, and Dr. Annelle Primm, Senior Medical Director of the Steve Fund, more “Interesting People Doing Important Work,” stories about “re-opening” told from the student perspective and more.
Events and Resources
On Thursday, October 29 at 1:00 pm ET, the American Council on Education in collaboration with The Steve Fund will host a webinar on How to Center Equity and Support Student Flourishing through mental health task forces. ACE and The Steve Fund will present their latest work on mental health task forces, followed by a moderated panel with David Rivera, faculty at Queens College-CUNY, Shirley Collado, president of Ithaca College, Janelle Goodwill, faculty at University of Chicago, and Ryan Houston-Dial, student at UT-San Antonio. Register and attend on ACE Engage for free.
The Jed Foundation recently launched a Student Engagement Toolkit which includes information about JED’s comprehensive approach to mental health promotion and suicide prevention, explainers on why and how to be an advocate for mental health, tips for self-care and improving well-being, and guidance about recognizing the signs of a friend going through a difficult time. The toolkit highlights on-campus organizations like Active Minds, DMAX clubs, and the Reflect organization.
Mental and Behavioral Health
In an op-ed in The Hill, Lyndon Haviland, DrPH, MPH, a distinguished scholar at the CUNY School of Public Health and Health Policy, argues that the Senate must pass Rep. Grace Napolitano’s (D, CA.) Mental Health Services for Students Act. Introduced in February 2019, the bill would provide $130 million in competitive grants to help schools develop programs to meet their students’ mental health needs. It has recently passed the house. “It’s now up to the Senate to lead by example and support our nation’s youth, a demographic that has been uniquely impacted by COVID-19,” writes Haviland.
Brad Wolgast, the director of the Center for Counseling & Student Development at the University of Delaware, said that the counseling center had prepared for a high uptick in demand for counseling services but has found that the wait times are actually shorter and that fewer students are reaching out. He said that a similar phenomenon occurred following the September 11th terrorist attacks in 2001. According to Wolgast, one factor contributing to the decline could be that all appointments are currently being held via video chat, and that students are experiencing zoom fatigue. He also mentioned that in a community-wide crisis, including this pandemic and as seen after 9/11, many students refocus their attention and take better care of themselves. Wolgast said that students living at home and studying remotely may rely more heavily on family members and roommates than they do while living at school, and may feel more supported and less likely to reach out to the counseling center. He did warn that the increased stressors may trigger worsening conditions for students with underlying mental health issues.
Students across the country continue to call on administrators to provide more breaks in the academic schedule to recharge. An article in Louisiana State University’s LSU Review calling for a longer break after midterms states, “The University needs to start thinking in the best interests of students when making academic calendars. That could mean giving students a couple of days of no classes or assignments due after midterms to build up mental health.” The Penn State Collegian asked students if the cancellation of spring break would affect their mental health? One student said, “I spend most of my time looking at a screen and in my room. If I continuously do that with no break, my mental health will surely start to deteriorate.” After cancelling spring break, Penn State says it will introduce wellness days to support the mental health of students next semester. An op-ed in the Tufts Daily argues that the university’s decision to shorten spring break from 9 days to a long weekend will damage student mental health “This plan aims to preserve the health and well-being of the Tufts community,” it reads. “However, sacrificing a longer spring break will negatively affect the mental health and academic performance of Tufts students. Tufts should reassess breaks within the spring semester schedule in order to provide students with sufficient time off and mediate community stress.”
In a virtual town hall last week, Emory University President Gregory L. Fenves and university administrators explained the university’s decision to condense the spring semester by starting classes later and eliminating spring break. Interim Provost Jan Love said, “We know everyone is exhausted. “We’re to trying to organize the spring semester to say to faculty, ‘Take a deep breath, judge the pace of your course and the content of your course in light of the fact that we’re all suffering through a pandemic.’” Dean of Campus Life Enku Gelaye said, “When I talk to students, although they understand we have counseling and we’re going to make additional resources available, what they’re really looking for is empathy and compassion and one-on-one engagement.”
Education Dive reports on the changes to grading policies at some schools this year. The University of Virginia recently relaxed their policies this fall by allowing its undergraduate students to take classes for credit or no credit instead of receiving letter grades. Provost Liz Magill wrote in a campuswide message last week, that conversations with students revealed high levels of stress, anxiety, and personal and family challenges among large numbers of students.” Bowling Green State University, in Ohio announced last week it is allowing students to switch to a pass/fail grading system. Ohio State University is offering the option for general education courses and within select majors. Students at several other schools are urging administrators to switch to a pass/fail system. Legislation passed by Harvard University’s Undergraduate Council calling for more flexible grading for the abnormal semester, reads “[It] is morally irresponsible to maintain a normal grading policy.”
The City University of New York is expanding its mental health services. The $5 million expansion, supported with funds allocated from the federal CARES Act, will allow CUNY colleges to reach more students with face-to-face online counseling and other remote wellness services. Some of the money will also be used to train and certify 120 campus clinical counselors in providing “teletherapy” services and to purchase new technology that will make it easier for students to access the mental health support services while classes remain largely online. The university is also instituting a policy allowing all CUNY students to use any campus food pantry within the system, in a move to help food-insecure students who don’t live near their home campuses.
Diversity, Equity and Inclusion
Shaylen Hardy, director of Black Campus Ministries, identified three strategies to support the well-being of Black college students, a population that were already experiencing mental health challenges at a higher rate than their non-Black counterparts prior to the pandemic, and are now disproportionately impacted. Hardy notes the power of serving others to promote wellbeing, the value of faith in the lives of Black students, and finding or creating more opportunities for students to connect.
The New York Times reports that Kappa Alpha, one of the nation’s largest and oldest college fraternities, has come under fire in recent months for its veneration of the confederate general Robert E. Lee – with the objection coming from within its own chapters. While students outside the fraternity have long taken issue with the fraternity’s antebellum themed parties and offensive songs lamenting the fact that the Union won the Civil War, the killing of George Floyd for the first time started a racial reckoning within its own ranks. In a statement, members of the Southwestern University chapter demanded that the fraternity drop its association with Lee and investigate the racial harms they say it has inflicted. “KA nationally has a deeply troubling history that active chapters can no longer cry ignorance to,” the statement reads. Kappa Alpha’s national organization then suspended the chapter.
The Daily Bruin reports that student activists at UCLA are calling to abolish campus police and to redistribute resources to alternative means of campus safety such as mental health resources as well as food and housing support. The coalition also wants UCLA to cut ties with the LAPD, given the police department’s history of discriminatory practices. In an op-ed in the Chronicle, Grace Watkins, a doctoral student in history at the University of Oxford, argues that campus police forces are problematic, and have a “long history of gender-based violence.” She writes that, “Universities must move beyond the endless cycle of committees and superficial reforms. The problems with the campus police are already apparent to anyone willing to look, and gender-based violence by campus officers is an important part of the case for abolition. An honest reckoning with the campus police is long overdue.”
A Swiss experiment conducted in 2018 and 2019 found that in introductory economics classes, when a female was the sole woman and the other three group members were men: she was 10 percentage points more likely to drop the course. The study included more than 600 college students and 150 study groups. Xiaoyue Shan, the researcher who conducted the study, explained to the Hechinger Report that the women were more likely to drop the economics course not only because “they find it difficult to interact” with a group of male students but also because the women became “less confident about their academic ability” when they were surrounded by men. Shan thinks her study could help women persist in male-dominated academic fields, like STEM and finance.
The Chronicle reports that amid a countrywide racial reckoning, colleges are changing their curriculum to reflect the reality of the moment. Efforts include: offering new classes on racial history and social justice, starting new minors, creating equity-and-justice centers, hiring ethnic-minority specialists in neglected topics, and strengthening bridges across disciplines in the sciences and the humanities. “We need not just mourn with our students but empower them to understand the context of the moment, the history of their community, and ways they can be active agents in improving society,” said Melanye Price, a professor of political science at Prairie View A&M University, a historically Black institution in Texas.
Coronavirus: Safety and Campus Reopenings
The Washtenaw County Health Department placed all University of Michigan undergraduate students under an emergency stay-in-place order, after data showed that Covid-19 cases among Michigan students represented more than 60% of all infections in the county. The order came from the Washtenaw County Health Department on Tuesday, and is set to continue until November 3. The decision, which was supported by university officials, came after a series of dorm outbreaks. Frustrations are growing on campus, as some students have continued to attend dorm parties and ignore public health guidelines, despite sharp increases in cases. Critics say the university’s fall reopening has been a disaster. “We continue, day in and day out, to remind administrators of the issues that we’re seeing on the front lines,” said Soneida Rodriguez, a resident adviser at one of the university’s smaller dorms. “The policies are not working, this is not going well, and we’re not seeing change quickly enough.”
As of Oct. 12, Clemson University has had 4,263 cumulative positive cases since June 2020, the highest number out of any other university in the United States, surpassing the University of Georgia. Since June, 16.03% of Clemson students have been infected with COVID-19.
The White House’s coronavirus task force has offered public health guidance to colleges, but many aren’t following it. The task force urged three Idaho universities to switch to online learning early this month, given high coronavirus positivity rates among young adults in their counties, but the schools did not follow the advice.
Education Dive reports that experts say that residential colleges holding classes in-person this fall should take precautions, including testing, when sending students home for winter break. “We’ve spent so much time thinking about how can we reopen schools, and before we know it, Thanksgiving break is here,” said Amber D’Souza, an epidemiology professor at Johns Hopkins University. “It’s an important thing to think through how can we in our new normal do this as safely as possible.”
The New York Times featured five college journalists reporting on campus life from their respective campuses, noting unusual scenes that are now the new normal. These include sticky notes in the shape of “Free Us” in a dorm window, students moving out for the semester in pajamas and in the rain to avoid a mandatory dorm- or campus-wide lockdown, and students living in fear of someone filling out a “snitch form” if they are seen not sneezing into their elbows.
Concerns over a convergence of the seasonal flu and COVID-19, a “twindemic,” on college campuses have invigorated campus health promotion initiatives encouraging continuing vigilance with regard to Covid-19 hygiene practices as well as flu vaccinations. The Wall Street Journal reported that 14% of colleges and universities have mandated flu vaccines for students, with options for medical or religious exemptions, with another 67% highly encouraging students to get vaccinated. To enforce vaccination for on-campus students, University of North Carolina Charlotte is locking students and faculty out of their university email if they do not report being vaccinated or claim an exemption. A University Business article highlighted best practice considerations for the situation, including increasing availability and access to flu vaccines for students, preparing to test for both the coronavirus and the seasonal flu, encouraging community members to stay home if they feel sick, and recognizing that many are experiencing higher than normal levels of anxiety and stress.
Student Success
With the fall semester well underway, numbers indicate that enrollment, and particularly enrollment at community colleges, has declined this year compared to years past. The New York Times’ Coronavirus Schools Briefing cited data from the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center that freshman enrollment at community colleges declined 22.7% compared to last year. This raises concerns because once a student stops out of higher education, they are much less likely to complete their degree. The Wall Street Journal further noted data from the same NSCRS release showing that freshman enrollment fell 16.1% nationwide across institutions.The articles mention that the higher education sector usually fares well during economic downturns, as adults without jobs often take the opportunity to earn degrees in higher ed. However, this does not appear to be the case today. As quoted in Education Dive, Doug Shapiro, NSCRS research executive director, said community college first-year students “are probably less likely to be able to come back, say, six months or even a year from now…I think there’s a real risk that this entire generation of students will take many, many years to recover from the declines.”
College Affordability
NPR is tracking issues in the upcoming presidential election, and outlined the differences between theTrump and Biden education plans. For higher education, Biden’s plans include: making public colleges, historically Black colleges and universities, and minority-serving institutions tuition-free for families making less than $125,000; making two years of community college and training programs tuition-free, and canceling $10,000 of every American’s student debt. Trump’s education policy has been largely centered on school choice. In February, however, the White House rolled out a proposed 2021 budget that would make significant cuts and restrictions to federal student loan programs.
A new report from the Center for American Progress suggests that Michigan’s community college district boundaries could be creating inequities in how much funding schools receive and what students pay for their education. The report recommends the state give more funding to community colleges in areas with lower property tax revenues and that schools stop charging out-of-district students higher tuition.
The Wall Street Journal reports that the family foundation of Hyatt Hotels founder Jay Pritzker has pledged $100 million to California’s community colleges, the largest gift ever for the sector. The money, to be spent over 20 years, is for scholarships and emergency financial aid for students who are close to completing their programs and need extra support to finish. “People are falling all over themselves to give to the large research universities. And that’s great,” said Dan Pritzker, president of the Jay Pritzker Foundation. “But we chose to do this to try and have impact and try to shine a light on community colleges and the huge opportunity that students have.”
Sexual Health
Sexually transmitted infections are at record levels in the United States and are particularly common among young adults, yet most sexually active college students have never been tested. New research led by George Mason University’s College of Health and Human Services found that the vast majority of sexually active students (88%) said they were “likely” or “extremely likely” to use STI self-testing services if they could take a test kit home and test themselves in the privacy of their own home/residence. Fifty nine percent said they would use STI self-testing services if they could test themselves in a private room at Student Health Services.
