Counseling Center prepares for improvements next semester

Over the course of the semester, requests for counseling services at colleges across the country have increased anywhere from 10-20 percent, and although Muhlenberg’s counseling center has not seen that increase, the same underlying issues are having an effect.

Currently, the waiting list to see a counselor is approximately three weeks long, but according to Allison Gulati, Dean of Students, reducing the waiting list as soon as possible is one of the most important aspects of the College’s short-term improvement plan.

“All students on the waiting list have been offered an opportunity at this point to come in for a more thorough assessment and to determine the best ongoing course of care for their situation,” said Gulati. From there, these students will either receive ongoing sessions at the Counseling Center, be referred to an off-campus provider, or have it determined that only a one-time check-in is necessary.

The more immediate fixes will also include increased hours, better triaging of issues before the appointments, and a survey assessment sent to students, faculty and staff, said Gulati. The hope is that all students—from those that are currently using the Counseling Center to non-users who either do not need the sessions or choose not to due to a bad experience—will respond. This should help the Counseling Center provide better overall services moving forward. The survey is currently being drafted, and will be sent out to the Muhlenberg community during the Spring 2017 semester.

There is also an incentive for the College to make these changes; nationwide research now points to graduates drawing future benefits from emotional support at college.

“If student feel emotionally supported while in college,” said Gulati, “they are far more likely to be more successful in a number of ways personally and professionally after graduation.”

However, while addressing these short-term issues is important, it does little to address the underlying circumstances that cause students to seek care.

In its 2015 Annual Report, the Center for College Mental Health at Penn State University determined that three main factors were leading to the rise in students seeking care. First, more students are beginning their college careers with already diagnosed conditions and are looking to continue counseling on campus. Second, faculty members are referring more students to on- campus centers than ever before. Lastly, and perhaps most importantly, the stigma about treating mental health issues is beginning to break, which in turn, also leads to more students seeking care.

It is more likely than not that these higher rates of students utilizing counseling services are here to stay. This means that colleges across the country—including Muhlenberg—will need long-term solutions that address these potentially permanent higher rates.

A recent article in the Chronicle of Higher Education has divided the strategies that schools are taking into four categories: expanding services, rationing resources, sorting students, and increasing referrals; they involve hiring more counselors, placing a limit on the number of sessions for each student, triaging students by severity of concern, and sending more students off- campus, respectively.

Muhlenberg’s long-term plan will likely include aspects from all of the above methodologies, but as of now, no decisions have been made.

“We are in the process of assessing our needs and, based on that assessment, we will be making some changes,” said Anita Kelly, Director of Counseling Services. “We do know that we need more therapists to meet the needs of our students.”

Gulati agrees, and said that data from that aforementioned assessment should drive long-term strategies, in conjunction with national best practices.

The Weekly also spoke with several students about their experiences at the Counseling Center, and due to the sensitive nature of these discussions, we have elected to report on them without providing any specifics from the sessions.

There were several common threads throughout the discussions. First, students stated that they felt the sessions were not personalized enough to their individual experiences or diagnoses. The students also expressed frustration with the process of prioritizing concerns, primarily because they felt their ‘low priority’ case ultimately went unaddressed. Lastly, almost all students mentioned that, for a variety of reasons, they felt their counselor devalued their need for help, and were frustrated by the inability to change counselors after a negative experience.

Moving forward, the goal will be to increase focus on wellness and preventative care, which would include stress reduction and sleep management, said Gulati. Additionally, the Counseling Center plans to do outreach with the intent of improving peer education so that students are better equipped to help other students.

“When it comes to physical and mental health and well-being, we need to proactively give students the tools to make good decisions and manage their own health,” said Gulati. “We also need to be effective in being responsive when students are in need of support.”

That said, this does not mean that improvements to the Counseling Center and its primary services will not happen during the spring as well.

“There is nothing more important than the health and well-being of our students,” said Gulati. “We will continue to be flexible and make changes to meet student needs to the fullest extent possible.”