Mental health challenges are among the greatest threats to student persistence and retention in higher education, but providing large-scale preventative and responsive mental health care is a looming challenge for colleges and universities.
In addition to having sufficient clinicians and trained professionals to support students in crisis, finding ways to deliver wellness support to students before they’re in crisis is critical.
One strategy is embedding mental health counselors into student spaces or academic departments. By integrating services into a physical location, such as a student center, clinicians can connect with students in informal and intentional ways, gaining their trust and supporting specific pockets of the campus community.
In this episode of Voices of Student Success, host Ashley Mowreader spoke with Estevan Garcia, chief wellness officer at Dartmouth College, to learn more about public health approaches to mental health support on college campuses. Later, hear from Casey Fox, associate director of integrated services from the University of South Carolina, who leads the university’s integrated mental health program, about how efforts have scaled.
Listen to the episode here and learn more about The Key here.