Mental Health | LearningWell Magazine

Student Voices

Posted on October 10, 2023February 7, 2024 by Amadeo Rodriguez

Carson Domey is a youth mental health advocate in his sophomore year at The University of Texas at Austin, studying Economics and Government. Carson currently serves as the chair of The Mary Christie Institute’s National Youth Council on College Student Mental Health.

In an increasingly connected world, it might seem paradoxical that loneliness has been deemed an epidemic by the U.S. Surgeon General. Yet, the profound impact of isolation on youth mental health is undeniable, as the life-altering effects of the COVID-19 pandemic highlighted the need for community and social connections, particularly within education.

For college students like myself, who left behind support systems and existing relationships, the need for a sense of belonging and companionship becomes ever-so-critical. The pandemic only exacerbated this challenge of socially acclimating into a new environment, as during COVID-19, opportunities to develop such skills were limited.

The impact of the pandemic on students cannot be understated. The abrupt shift to online learning equally impacted students’ social and academic development. The absence of in-person interactions and hallmark experiences throughout high school and college resulted in students missing crucial social development opportunities. These skills, such as forming relationships, effective communication, and collaboration, hindered as a result of the lack of ample opportunities to hone such traits.

While online classes offered some benefits in terms of flexibility and accessibility, this medium certainly came with a price. The absence of natural social interactions in classrooms, lecture halls, and hallways left a void that no virtual meeting or Zoom icebreaker questions could fill. The spontaneous lighthearted moments during class and the collective energy and camaraderie lacked due to the nature of this new means of education.

As a student at the University of Texas at Austin, this fall, I have witnessed firsthand the commitment by faculty to address this issue. The first week of school included not only overviews of syllabi, but an emphasis from professors on the importance of fostering community in and out of the classroom. For example, many professors allot specific times for students to meet and engage with their peers during lectures, and we have furthered these bonds throughout the semester by working together on group projects. The dedication to creating a connected environment was echoed throughout classes as small as 30 students to lectures as large as 150 students. This trend sends a resounding message: even in the face of adversity, the critical essence of community is irreplaceable.

Fostering such an environment requires educators to go beyond the conventional boundaries of their roles and see themselves as facilitators of both knowledge and community. Equally, students must be willing to step out of their comfort zones, engage with their peers, and invest in the bonds that will endure throughout their academic journeys and lives. The benefits of community and a connected college experience can contribute positively to mental health, academic performance, and overall well-being.

“For college students like myself, who left behind support systems and existing relationships, the need for a sense of belonging and companionship becomes ever-so-critical.”

The declaration of a loneliness epidemic and post-pandemic landscape underlines the urgent need to invest in and prioritize building community through education. The impact of COVID-19 on students’ ability to socialize and develop essential interpersonal skills warrants a response. It is my hope that educators’ dedication to building connections will continue to grow and serve as a beacon of resilience in the face of the recent adversity experienced by students and faculty alike. By recognizing and embracing the importance of community on college campuses, we can shape a culture and environment capable of bringing out the best in the next generation.

The Practical Wisdom of Elizabeth Cracco, PhD

Posted on September 14, 2023September 20, 2023 by Amadeo Rodriguez

Elizabeth “Betsy” Cracco does not take herself too seriously, avoids jargon, and explains public health and community wellbeing strategies with analogies involving frogs and ponds and building houses.

Cracco’s plain-speaking approach may serve her well as she continues her role as assistant vice chancellor for Campus Life and Wellbeing, a newly-created position at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, aimed at one of the biggest challenges facing higher education today — improving wellbeing among a generation of students reporting high rates of anxiety, depression, and loneliness. Cracco’s office oversees Recreation and Wellbeing, Residential Life, and the Center for Counseling and Psychological Health, a three-legged stool supporting students’ psychological and physical health. She said the nexus of all of these domains underpins her mission.

“One of the biggest prescription pads we have is making connections and creating a sense of belonging–and you can’t do that from a seat in the counseling center alone,” she said.

Cracco said cabinet-level wellness positions like hers are becoming more common on college campuses, due to the increased concern over student mental health and the growing acknowledgment that what has been called the campus mental health crisis is more of a public health problem, meaning multiple departments need to get involved to address it. In many ways, Cracco’s professional trajectory aligns with this expanded view.

After graduating from College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, Massachusetts, Cracco received a master’s degree in counseling from Boston College, then a doctorate in counseling psychology from the University of Wisconsin Madison. Holy Cross, a Jesuit school, had a strong sense of community and it was there that she took an interest in mind-body practices and attending retreats. Her first job was in residential life, living in a dorm, where she quickly learned that the position functioned as a way for students to share their personal stories, from eating disorders to relationship issues. Her professional training included the relational culture model out of Wellesley College, a feminist ideology that puts the emphasis on the individual in context within the community. This led her to apply a public health approach to her work.

“It occurs to you after you go from client to client in direct care that something else is wrong,” she said. “There is a systemic problem here we need to think about. In other words, if all of the frogs in the pond are sick, why are we still asking, ‘What’s wrong with this frog?’”

Cracco said her metaphorical move up-stream started early. When she was head of counseling at the University of Connecticut, she began a retreat program called C2 for “Connect and Challenge,” involving whitewater rafting, storytelling, and meditation. When the new position of (then called) executive director of wellness opened at UMass Amherst, the state flagship campus, Cracco went for it. In her pitch presentation, her first slide included Maya Angelou’s advice on what we need to ask each other when we move into any social setting: “Do you see me? Do I know that you care about me? Is it important I am here?”

“If all of the frogs in the pond are sick, why are we still asking, ‘What’s wrong with this frog?’”

“If we could enact this same approach at a community level, it would mean that no matter what your struggles are, you would be held and you would not be alone because your community mates would be there, many going through the same struggles,” said Cracco.

When she got the job in 2019, Cracco asked herself, “Am I hired to create a cohesion across three units on a campus, or am I hired to promote wellbeing across the entire campus?” She figured, either way, it was about crossing silos and making connections, something that became surprisingly possible during the pandemic and would lead to UMass signing on to the Okanagan Charter: An International Charter for Health Promoting Universities and Colleges.

“During the pandemic, we really demonstrated how we could work together as a campus and how the academic side of the house can provide real, on-the-ground services. The public health students, the nursing students, they ran the clinics, gave the vaccinations, all of it. After that, our dean of public health, dean of nursing, and vice chancellor of student affairs got together and said, ‘How can we keep this going?’ We figured the starting point was signing on to the Okanagan Charter.”

Having the buy-in from then Chancellor, Kumble Subbaswamy, a prerequisite in signing the charter, meant that everyone on campus had some responsibility to promote wellbeing, including faculty. Cracco said the tie-in to student success helped make the case.

“You are not going to do well academically if you never sleep, eat trash, and have no social life, and we need to communicate that to students,” she said. “We all need to get out of the boxes we’ve made.”

As an example of out-of-the-box thinking, Cracco’s team introduced a curriculum developed by the Benson-Henry Institute for Mind Body Medicine at Mass General Hospital, called Positivity and Relaxation. The nine-session, credit-bearing course is taught in small groups and helps students self-regulate around anxiety in particular, but also depression. It is not an alternative to therapy for those who need it, but an option for all students on campus. Cracco said they are running 300 to 400 students a year through these small group sessions and they’re receiving data on its effectiveness from the school of public health.

“You are not going to do well academically if you never sleep, eat trash, and have no social life, and we need to communicate that to students.”

“We are seeing tremendous reductions in stress, increases in wellbeing, even increases in sense of belonging,” said Cracco.

The course is funded by her office, but not owned and operated by any one department. As she tinkers with its scale, Cracco is working with professionals within and beyond campus on developing other courses, some involving storytelling, and working closely with a colleague on courses specific to building resilience and belonging in students of color. As big a fan as she is of retreats, she said representation is an important consideration to watch in mind-body practices. “Who is teaching these practices?” she asks. “How do students feel when they are in them? There’s definitely a privileged, “Lululemon” subculture that exists here and we need to be aware of that.”

As far as other programs go, whether it’s pond fire chats or another unnamed project involving swings she is secretly plotting, Cracco is full force as long as it is about making connections and forming relationships. One of her latest efforts is to create quiet dining spaces for groups to eat “family style.”

“We should be structuring connections at every turn,” she said. Asked about how this work plays out in the classroom, Cracco made an interesting point about technologies like ChatGPT.

“We are no longer in a system where we have a person who has all the knowledge and people who receive that knowledge, because knowledge is everywhere,” she said. “Now, the process of learning is the process of learning together, like we do in the real world, and that is going to force a structure that is more communal, more experiential.”

Cracco is optimistic about the wellness work taking place at UMass: “I think people are getting the upstream thing,” she said. At the same time, the down-to-earth Cracco is realistic about how much can be done, given what she calls “the tyranny of time.” As an example, she leans into her first higher ed job in residential life and compares that to the myriad of duties and trainings that those professionals now need to complete.

“What these people really want to be doing is making space for students,” she said. “We need professional staff to attend to those crisis situations, and these can be incredibly time consuming. How do we develop the human capital to make space for connection beyond, before and apart from the crises?”

Q&A with Marcus Hotaling, Director of the Eppler-Wolff Counseling Center at Union College and President of AUCCCD

Posted on August 22, 2023August 23, 2023 by Amadeo Rodriguez

In March 2023, the Association for University and College Counseling Center Directors (AUCCCD) released a policy paper that provides a foundation for structuring how higher education can approach mental health support. “Navigating a Path Forward for Mental Health Services in Higher Education” lays out some of the issues facing the field, including staff burnout and turnover, misallocation of resources, lack of coordination between campus stakeholders, ineffective or incongruous treatment models and the proliferation of third-party vendors. The paper offers some recommendations for addressing these concerns with an overarching theme that campus stakeholders must work together to create a realistic, agreed-upon, campus-wide approach–and then act on that plan with consistent messaging and communication to all constituents. This month, LearningWell (LW) magazine interviewed Dr. Marcus Hotaling, director of the Eppler-Wolff Counseling Center at Union College and president of the AUCCCD, to discuss the paper and “the path forward.”

LW: The AUCCCD recently published a paper that lays out a path forward for college mental health services amid high rates of mental health concerns and help-seeking among college students, and at the same time, increased burnout and dissatisfaction among counselors. What led the AUCCCD to develop this paper?

MH: I think we’ve all been feeling the burnout for some years. Every year, up until the pandemic, my counseling center was seeing increased utilization—more students and more sessions. And while more students is understandable, we continuously saw more sessions with the same amount of staff, going above the national standard of about 65% face-to-face time for counselor. When I became president of AUCCCD in 2021, we had started to look at themes as to why people were leaving. We have 895 active members. In that first year, 81 of our members left for various reasons. Burnout was a huge factor, due to, in large part, getting pressure from all directions. You’re getting pressure from the students who want to be seen right away. You’re getting pressure from parents calling you. And then you’re getting pressure from the higher-ups who are getting called by parents or faculty members.

We also looked at where these counselors were going. The majority of them, two thirds, left the field of higher education and went into private practice. And there were two factors that led to that. The first was salary—you can make more in private practice. Some people went to the local hospitals and the salary is $50,000 more than their institution was paying. And the second reason was that, when you’re in private practice and you’re full, you just say, “I’m sorry, I’m not accepting new patients.” You can’t do that in a college setting. So, we started to look at the burnout piece and how higher ed and counseling can work together to try to resolve this problem.

LW: What were your goals in issuing this paper? What was it meant to convey?

MH: We didn’t want to just say, “Colleges, you just need to hire more people,” because we know that’s not realistic. But what is realistic is everybody coming to the table and saying, “What services do we want to offer?” Let’s all be on the same page; let’s all have the same messaging around that, and then let’s actually do that. Because, in the counseling center, we can develop whatever service model we want, but if admissions or faculty or someone else is telling a student they could be seen six times a week, that’s not helpful. If we have people saying there are session limits when we don’t have session limits, that’s not helpful.

It’s important for counseling center leadership and student affairs leadership, and presidents, to come up with a plan of action to determine, based on the staffing we have, what we can provide. There needs to be a plan of action.

LW: The paper points out that colleges are making decisions about the service delivery model based on meeting the volume of demand, rather than taking an outcomes-based approach. Why, in your view, are institutions approaching mental health care that way?

MH: I think part of it is that, for the most part, it’s really just fallen onto the counseling center staff to say what we need to do. And the reality is, that can be really hard when you don’t have the opportunity to step back and try something different or think about how it can be done differently.

I’m going to use my center as an example. There was one day that I opened up the schedule and there were just tons of appointments. And I said to my associate director, “Look, I’m seeing your schedule today. That’s not healthy. Your last patient is getting nothing from you. You’re exhausted.” So, we sat down over a school break and looked at how to change things. Everything was on the table. And that takes time, and it takes trust. We did get some pushback from our staff, but the approach was to give it a shot until the end of the year. And if it didn’t work, we’d change it again.

The reason why the usual approach is all over the place is that we’re just trying to meet the demand. And it’s like a dam that’s breaking where we plug one hole, and then all of a sudden there’s another hole over here. It’s still coming in; the water’s still flowing. And how many fingers do I have to plug these holes? And it’s only when you can take that step back that you can come up with a new way of doing things.

The demand is so high and you’re just trying to bail water out of the boat before you can actually sit down and plan. And that’s what we were trying to say in this paper: 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?” And we will work around that with the current staff. And maybe we’ll need to grow staff in the future.

But we are starting to see the numbers fall. One of the positives that came out of the pandemic is that states are starting to look at patients being able to cross over state lines for care. Clinicians are also more comfortable using telehealth and teletherapy. So, if you’ve been working with somebody for a long time, rather than saying, “Go see somebody at college because you’re two hours away,” counselors can continue to see their patients. So, the numbers are falling a little bit, but a little bit from a flood is still a flood.

“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?”

LW: You point out that there is a mismatch of expectations, like having admissions promote a certain number of sessions that does not align with the reality of what can be offered. But even if you fix that inconsistency in messaging, do you think there’s also a cultural expectation that students, when they get to college, are going to be cared for in this way and they’re going to have access to therapy? And if so, is there going to be a difficulty in pushing back against that cultural expectation?

MH: Absolutely. Look, students are paying a lot of money to go to college, and with that comes a certain level of expectation across the board. When it comes to the expectations that parents have or families have, we also need to move away from the normalcy that every student is going to get through in four years. And that taking some time off isn’t a bad thing if you’re making good use of that time by working on yourself and getting healthy, so that when you come back, you’re going to be in a better place.

LW: So many issues, like leaves of absence as you suggest, involve more of a public health approach. What is the role of the counseling center in this approach?

MH: This whole thing is a public health problem. And I say that not to remove our responsibility or the individual responsibility of the students or counseling center. There are two reasons I say this is a public health problem. One, counseling centers and mental health for the past 20 years has been pushing for parity. We should be treated just like physical health. Let’s reduce the stigma. And it worked and that’s good. And then you have a challenging outside world. There’s war, there’s political unrest, a recession, a pandemic, school shootings. All these things create anxiety. On top of that, we have these expectations, real or imagined, that everybody else’s life is perfect, which we can see on their Instagram reel.

So, for a public health approach, yes, the community needs to do better about addressing gun violence and addressing systemic racism. But once they’re on our campuses, we can give students the tools to stay happy and healthy, while also recognizing that [every person is] going to have bad days.

We also need to help our constituents around campus recognize when somebody actually needs therapy versus when they might just need empathy or a listening ear. We need to help faculty and staff understand that referring a student to counseling is not the first thing you do. The first thing to do is say, “Are you okay? What do you need? I’m so sorry.”

These are public health approaches that are very, very simple and need no training from a mental health professional. All of us on a college campus can be approaching this from a public health perspective. It’s a public health issue, and now we need to be using our public health solutions.

LW: All of this – counseling staff wellbeing, policies and procedures and service delivery–its all about overall student health, correct?

MH: Absolutely. Because if we’re not healthy, how are we helping anybody?

And evidence shows that students who utilize mental health services are retained and graduate at a higher percentage than those who don’t receive mental health care. And in theory, those are the students that are most at risk—the ones that are unhappy, the ones that have a mental health diagnosis. In a National Association of Mental Illness report, 64% of students that are no longer enrolled in higher ed list mental health as the main reason. So, it’s about student success as well.

New report on the enduring impact of COVID on the mental wellbeing of emerging adults

Posted on August 2, 2023August 2, 2023 by Gaby Harlid

In a new paper sponsored by the Ruderman Family Foundation, Jeffrey Arnett, PhD, details the disproportionate and enduring impact of COVID-19 on the mental wellbeing of “emerging adults.” Arnett, a senior research scholar at Clark University, is a uniquely appropriate author for the paper, as he coined the term “emerging adults” over 20 years ago to describe young people in their twenties who exist in the “space between adolescence and young adulthood.” Arnett is also the executive director of the Society for the Study of Emerging Adulthood (SSEA), and author of Emerging Adulthood: The Winding Road from the Late Teens Through the Twenties.

In The Mental Health Effects of COVID-19- A Continuing Crisis, Especially for Emerging Adults ages 18-29, Arnett examined national data from before and during the COVID-19 pandemic from sources such as the CDC, the National Center for Health Statistics, the U.S. Bureau of the Census, the National Opinion Research Center, and the Pew Research Center, as well as numerous longitudinal studies from the literature. His research showed that psychological distress was consistently higher for young adults ages 18-29 than all older age groups from March 2020 to September 2022, despite that group being at lowest risk physically from the disease.

“You would think that it would be the older people who would be the most affected in their mental health, because they were the most at risk for hospitalization and death during the pandemic, and they still are,” said Arnett in a June interview for the Mary Christie Institute’s podcast, the Quadcast. “It’s actually just the opposite. The oldest Americans are the ones who are least likely to report symptoms of anxiety and depression. Meanwhile, the emerging adults, the 18- to 29-year-olds, were the most affected in terms of their mental health.”

While Arnett said he was initially surprised by the data, he posited a few justifications in the report, starting with the outsize influence of the pandemic’s disruption on people in the midst of an intense developmental period. While life disruptions were not unique to the age group, Arnett said, “from age 18 to 29, you’re trying to build the structure of an adult life. That’s the age where most people are getting the education that’s going to form the basis of a long-term occupation or profession, when people are moving out of their parents’ household, learning how to function as an adult on their own. It’s the age when people are having romantic relationships, thinking about what they want in a partner. And suddenly, all of this is blown up.”

In the report, Arnett pointed out that this population experienced disruptions or changes to the five features distinctive to the emerging adulthood life stage: identity explorations, during which they explore who they are, “trying out various possible futures;” instability, which was greatly exacerbated by the pandemic; self-focus (specifically in relation to parental ties waning), which veered into loneliness when they were cut off from their friends; feeling in between childhood and adulthood, which was extended during this time period; and optimism and high hopes about future possibilities, which were dimmed by the circumstances surrounding the pandemic.

“You would think that it would be older people who would be the most affected in their mental health, because they were the most at risk for hospitalization and death during the pandemic but it’s actually just the opposite.”

But, while there are clear, reasonable causes for the intense reaction to the initial disruption of the pandemic by emerging adults, Arnett said he was mystified that their rates of anxiety and depression have remained so high. In the paper, he noted that the rates of anxiety and depression for emerging adults remained as high in early 2023 as at the peak of the pandemic before vaccines were available–nearly 40% for anxiety disorder and nearly 35% for depression. (In fact, symptoms have remained above pre-pandemic levels for all adult age groups.) That pattern is continuing even now as the pandemic has waned, the report states. “Even after life has returned to normal in most ways, rates of anxiety and depression are nearly as high as they were at the peak of the pandemic. That was shocking,” he said. “Why do people still feel so bad even though life appears to have gone back to normal in so many ways?” he continued.

The report also highlights subgroups of emerging adults that have disproportionately borne the brunt of the pandemic from a mental wellbeing perspective: women and Asian Americans. Even though young women’s rates of depression and anxiety were already higher than young men before the pandemic, the report states, the gap between them has grown since the pandemic began. Arnett noted that this follows a long-standing pattern in mental health research, in which females report worse mental health outcomes across the spectrum. However, he called the widening of the difference “striking.”

Disturbingly, the pandemic triggered a racist backlash against Asian Americans, which may account for their disproportionate worsening of mental health. In addition to higher rates of mental health issues, most Asian Americans also reported believing that violence against their ethnic group is increasing; almost three quarters said they worry sometimes, almost every day, or every day that they might be threatened or attacked due to their ethnicity.

The paper outlines five recommendations for addressing the current mental health crisis and preparing for the next pandemic. Arnett recommends: reforming the mental health delivery system; expanding and improving teletherapy services; creating a website of resources for parents of emerging adults; improving online learning techniques; and holding a national conference of practitioners and policymakers at colleges and universities that examines which policies and programs were effective and which were not. He also recommends further examination into the phenomenon of why these levels of distress are not subsiding for emerging adults, including in-depth qualitative research with the young people themselves.

“We need to urgently go forward with interviewing people, not just survey data, not just ‘tell me on a scale of one to five how anxious you feel or how depressed you feel,’ but ‘tell me in your own words why you’re still distressed.’”

Young Professionals of Color Speak Out About Workplace Climates

Posted on July 17, 2023August 8, 2023 by Kevin

Understanding how young graduates of color experience their predominantly White workplaces is a critical part of creating flourishing cultures within increasingly diverse work environments. As corporations and organizations continue to work at this with varying success, the Steve Fund has released a new report that can help guide their efforts.

In “Supporting the Successful Transition of Young People of Color into the Workforce,” The Steve Fund surveyed 160 young professionals of color on cultural dynamics that affect their wellbeing and, as an extension, their job performance, satisfaction, and retention. The results showed that half of those surveyed reported experiencing microaggressions at their places of employment; and half said they do not feel a sense of inclusion or belonging. These and other findings send a strong message to employers about the DEI work that lies ahead, despite increased efforts on the part of employers to attract and retain professionals of color.

“We know that employers face challenges reaching recruitment and retention goals and young people of color face challenges transitioning into the workforce,” said Evan Rose, president and co-founder of the Steve Fund, the nation’s leading organization focused on supporting the mental health and emotional wellbeing of young people of color. “These interrelated challenges present us with an opportunity to leverage the talents of a diverse workforce for growth and support young employees of color in inclusive and culturally responsive ways.”

In addition to the survey findings, the new report outlines a detailed framework for how employers can respond to what young professionals of color are reporting while creating more inclusive workplaces that will help attract and retain young people of color. Like the “Equity in Mental Health Framework,” which has helped colleges and universities customize strategies that support the mental health of college students of color, the Steve Fund has taken a similar approach for young people transitioning into the workforce, helping employers better prepare for them with tools and resources that foster equity, inclusion, accountability, and mental health.

“A key benefit to this work is that it connects what colleges and universities are doing to support the mental health and wellbeing of students of color with what employers want and need to do in the workplace,” said Dr. Paula Johnson, president of Wellesley College, a liberal arts college that has been a leader in inclusive excellence, with a focus on students’ mental health. “By drawing those connections and building on the mutual learning that results, we can work to maintain the gains we’ve made with young people of color who enter work environments that may hamper their sense of belonging and impede their ability to thrive.”

Stress, Belonging, and Mental Health

Marcus had been a few months into his first job out of college when he was asked to join his boss and a few other colleagues for lunch. He remembers being excited to be included among the group of executives and was feeling good about the way he had handled himself. Then, one of the executives complimented him on being articulate, saying, as if with surprise, “Wow, you really have an excellent vocabulary.” Marcus, who is Black, felt the familiar sting. “After that, I was completely deflated,” he said. “I just wanted to get out of there.” Not long after the incident, he switched jobs.

An underlying issue that influences these findings is the lack of diversity within the corporate workforce.

Unfortunately, Marcus’ experience is all too common as the Steve Fund survey bears out. Participants were asked to respond to questions relating to four key workplace dynamics: perception of workplace discrimination; experiences of isolation and belonging; need for psychological safety; and importance of cultural competence. Among the findings, 50% reported experiencing microaggressions, 30% said work stress impacts their emotional wellness, 50% said they don’t feel a sense of inclusion and belonging at their place of employment, and 30% reported spending time looking for another job.

Other findings are instructive in helping employers understand where, specifically, professionals of color are looking for change. Half of young professionals said that management doesn’t foster a workplace that allows employees to be themselves; half also report not knowing where to go if they experience discrimination; and 41% said they do not have access to culturally competent mental health resources. One in three young employees does not feel emotionally supported at work.

An underlying issue that influences these findings is the lack of diversity within the corporate workforce—a tenacious problem that leaders throughout the country are continuing to grapple with. According to the report, Blacks make up about 10% of college degree holders, but only 3.2% of executives/senior level managers. Employees of color also have high attrition rates. People of color and younger employees were more likely to have quit their jobs in 2021; feeling disrespected was a key reason for leaving. The report cites more than three in ten young employees of color (Black and Latinx) experience discrimination at work, leading to increased levels of stress, anxiety, and hopelessness.

The upside of creating workplaces that disrupt these trends is not lost on competitive companies, which is why organizations are reaching out to sources like the Steve Fund for help. The report cites research showing that workplaces that cultivate a culture of belonging experience higher levels of creativity, innovation, and profitability. Employees who feel emotionally supported at work are less likely to experience mental health symptoms, less likely to underperform, have higher job satisfaction, and are more likely to stay at their companies.

“Marcus, who is Black, felt the familiar sting. ‘After that, I was completely deflated,’ he said. ‘I just wanted to get out of there.’ Not long after the incident, he switched jobs.”

“It’s pretty simple,” said Dr. Jessica Isom. “Any time a person cares about something and is invested in something, they are going to show up better as an individual, contribute better as a team member, and overall contribute to a better outcome. That has to be grounded in what we all need as humans, which are genuine, authentic interactions. That’s what we thrive on. And I think everybody can appreciate that.” Isom said the absence of those positive interactions in the workplace, coupled with mental health strains brought on by systemic racism, cause young professionals of color to protect themselves by leaving.

Dr. Isom is a board-certified community psychiatrist and one of the Steve Fund’s multicultural mental health experts. She holds a faculty role at the Yale School of Medicine, where she also trained, and co-directs the Social Justice and Health Equity Curriculum (SJHE), addressing workforce development of psychiatrists to address mental health disparities.

“Conversations around building diverse workplaces tend to focus on desiring diversity, which is really focused on recruitment, the idea of inviting people in,” she said. “What we need to be thinking about is how to be a good host, and that means understanding who you are inviting in and what their needs are.”

Tracy Burns, chief executive officer of the Northeast Human Resources Association (NEHRA), agrees that as earnest as employers are to attract diverse talent, more focus needs to be placed on how that talent is received and how those employees of color experience workplace cultures. “Efforts to attract young professionals of color do not end when the offer is accepted. Employers need to build a comprehensive and sustainable approach that takes into consideration the “whole person” and fosters an environment where differences are recognized, respected, and even celebrated. This report offers both critical data that all employers should be aware of as well as concrete recommendations that can help direct your DEI efforts towards a more meaningful outcome.”

“(This work) has to be grounded in what we all need as humans, which are genuine, authentic interactions. That’s what we thrive on. And I think everybody can appreciate that.”

The Steve Fund report recommends a myriad of strategies, ranging from overarching principles like weaving mental health and racial equity into the corporate blueprint and empowering leadership to support healthy workplaces to specific strategies that address each of the issues uncovered in the survey. These include equipping managers to make wellness at work an everyday priority; investing in mentoring at every stage in career development; and creating “wellness mentors” who are peers trained by multicultural mental health experts to provide culturally competent support and connect employees to resources.

Dr. Isom provides an example of changes employers can make as she imagines a different outcome for Marcus and his boss at the corporate lunch. “One of the recommendations in the report is about building a senior leadership bench that is able to facilitate the progression of young people of color. It is even more important that individuals in leadership positions reduce their level of obliviousness to their own experiences and then arm themselves with what’s necessary to support a young person of color throughout their journey. Because of their power and influence, their actions will have a ripple effect throughout the whole organization.”

The Steve Fund’s mission is to promote the mental health and emotional wellbeing of young people of color as they transition from adolescence into higher education, throughout their higher education experience, and as they transition into the workforce so they can attain personal, academic, and career success and achieve their full potential. The Steve Fund works with colleges and universities, nonprofits, researchers, mental health experts, families, and young people to promote programs and strategies that build understanding and assistance for the mental and emotional health of the nation’s young people of color.

When Supporters Struggle

Posted on July 17, 2023August 8, 2023 by Kevin

The chair of the department wasn’t herself. This was clear to her advisees, who noticed their professor becoming disengaged and disorganized, and inconsistent in following through with paperwork and information. They suspected it might have something to do with the campus tragedy: A student in one of the professor’s classes had died by suicide earlier in the year, and she was taking it hard.

“I wanted to tell her how sorry I was, but I didn’t want to make her more upset,” said a sophomore advisee. “So, I found other ways to get the information instead of bothering her.”

There is much concern these days about the mental health of college students, and with good reason. During the 2020–2021 school year, more than 60% of college students matched the criteria for at least one mental health problem, according to a study by the Healthy Minds Network (HMN), and meeting demands for treatment is a challenge for counseling centers.

Less discussed, however, is the mental health of the faculty and staff. As the adults who see the students regularly, they are uniquely positioned to see whether their students are thriving, or seem out of sorts, or even attending class consistently. Which is an added stressor in work upended by the pandemic, on a career path already paved with unusual professional strain.

“There’s an old saying, ‘A good teacher is like a candle—it consumes itself to light the way for others,’” said a sociology professor in Washington, D.C. “I don’t think whoever coined that phrase had this kind of ‘consuming’ in mind.”

These days, faculty members are consumed with whether the students are okay, why they aren’t showing up for class, and how to handle the deluge of requests for accommodations, extensions, and exceptions. Recent political, racial, and harassment tensions have brought not just campus unrest, but also inquiries, investigations, and lawsuits. Many professors’ own work and research went dead in the water with COVID. The sociology professor counted four colleagues who’d either retired early in the wake of COVID or left teaching for the private sector, citing better pay and a more sane work-life balance. “Most of the burnout I’m hearing about doesn’t even have much to do with teaching itself.”

Or as one English department head put it, “The job you’re responsible for today is not the same job you got hired for 20 years ago.”

Studying the teachers: Who’s supporting the supporters?

After its survey of student mental health, HMN partnered with the Boston University School of Public Health (BUSPH) and the Mary Christie Institute (MCI) on a survey of faculty perspectives on the state of student mental and behavioral health. Findings published in 2022 show that about 80% of faculty members reported having had conversations in the past year with students about their mental health. And one in five reported that supporting students in emotional distress has taken a toll on their own mental health.

“Classroom environments are one of the only places that every student is actually present. So, the vast majority of faculty are in this role of contact in some capacity,” said Sarah Lipson, an associate professor at BUSPH and a principal investigator of the study. “It was really important to have data to say we know that faculty are already playing a role in supporting student mental health; we no longer need to guess as to whether or not that’s happening. And I think probably without data we would underestimate how common it is.”

“There’s an old saying, ‘A good teacher is like a candle—it consumes itself to light the way for others,’ I don’t think whoever coined that phrase had this kind of ‘consuming’ in mind.”

It isn’t surprising that faculty members report feeling like their work goes well beyond typical job hours and boundaries; student expectations of faculty extend further than the classroom. According to a Student Voice survey by College Pulse with Inside Higher Ed, students are looking to their professors for more than course content. More than half sought introductions to people working in their fields of interest, while 45% wanted professors to hear them on personal matters and to consider making accommodations because of them; and 28% hoped for help navigating college life.

Navigating college life can cover a lot of ground for an unhappy student looking for a helping hand. Last fall, a professor at Texas Christian University received a disturbing email from a student saying thank you for everything the professor had done for him, but closing by saying he was going to jump off a parking garage. TCU had lost a student in a similar way a few years before, and kicked into emergency mode trying to locate the student and stake out all the possible garages. As it turns out, the student’s walking route toward the football stadium garage passed the counseling center where he’d just begun an on-campus IOP (Intensive Outpatient Program). He made a spontaneous decision to go into the counseling center instead, said Eric Wood, director of mental health counseling at TCU—a significant benefit to having an on-campus IOP. Still, the email and frantic galvanizing was a shot of adrenaline that carries the lasting weight of stress and responsibility—pressure felt by faculty and staff, and of course, counselors.

Greg Eells was the beloved director of Cornell University’s counseling center for more than 15 years. In March of 2019, he left to take a similar position at the University of Pennsylvania. His marching orders there: to increase capacity; decrease the time between a first consultation and a first counseling appointment; better distinguish short-term care, long-term care, and other kinds of wellness care; and expand the availability of phone, video, texting and app-based technologies that can be accessed anywhere, at any time, to support students in crisis. Eells also taught both graduate and undergraduate students in courses on counseling and psychology. No small balancing act, but he was a known superstar. Eells had also served as chair of the Mental Health Section of the American College Health Association, and won the Association for University and College Counseling Center Director’s Award for Excellence.

The September after his move, both campuses were shocked to learn that he’d jumped to his death from a building near his new home in Philadelphia. His suicide devastated colleagues, and sparked soul-searching about the pressures of being a campus therapist, a constant watchdog. It also opened up a thoughtful dialogue on expectations we hold of the people looked upon to always be the strongest in the room.

An editorial in The Daily Pennsylvanian expressed well the pressure on caregivers to have it all together, all the time.

“The capacity of helpers to give sound advice, to listen attentively, and to go out of their way to help others leads us to believe they must be healthy themselves. The qualities we attribute to the helpers in our lives ultimately feed into the assumption they are immune to the problems and emotions we all face,” the editorial wrote. “While it may be easy to assume that helpers are invincible, it’s also dangerous. It’s one of the reasons we don’t think to check in with them and don’t remind ourselves that they’re human, too. People who give a lot of themselves to help others can experience pain, love, and hurt as we all do.”

COVID habits and harms

It’s been well documented that COVID was a strange and challenging time for education. From the university professor’s standpoint, it was a two-headed beast: learning to host classes online, from your side of the unfamiliar platform, and trying to remain connected with the struggling people in the squares on the other side. Being a faculty member during COVID meant having students who may or may not show up for class, and not knowing why. It meant not knowing who was living on campus or off, with or without a decent support network (or wifi network). It meant all the complicated communications that come with masking, especially hard for students with hearing loss or for whom English isn’t a first language. And now, post-COVID, it means contending with lackluster student commitment, and not knowing how much of the ongoing absenteeism, missing skills, and requests for grade leniency should be excused with accommodations.

“One of the ancillary effects many of my colleagues talk about is that students don’t seem to believe in deadlines anymore, and it’s like the time online made it seem as though you don’t really have to come to campus anymore,” said John Hess, a senior lecturer in the English department at UMass Boston. He lost his youngest brother early during the pandemic, and was very empathetic to COVID’s effects on students and their families. “The faculty really, really care a great deal. They worry about their students and are very committed to student success. And so, when students don’t come to class, or when they don’t get the work done on time, it’s not just that it annoys us; it’s that they’re cheating themselves and missing out.”

Professors were also a natural target for student frustration during the pandemic. After all, they were the single point of official school contact via squares on a computer.

“During the midst of COVID, you definitely saw a lot of high expectation of instant responses and a lot of demands, for lack of a better word, about how things should be,” said Eric Wood, director of TCU’s counseling center. “There was a lot of pressure for faculty and administration to know all the answers. Everyone was scrambling, and students would say, ‘You should know the answer.’ It’s a global pandemic. But kids were expecting immediate support and help.”

And if professors weren’t able to provide answers or respond in a satisfying way, their ratings went down—ratings that are taken into consideration for performance reviews and tenure.

“Anonymous reviews can be brutal,” said David Kroll, professor of Pharmacology and director of Master’s & Certificate Programs at University of Colorado Skaggs School of Pharmacy & Pharmaceutical Sciences. Kroll, a sometime contributor to Forbes magazine, wrote a 2013 article “Top 10 reasons Why Being a University Professor is a Stressful Job.” Anonymous reviews—which influence everything from tenure, publication, and grant applications—were one of them, as was the business of securing funding for one’s research, which COVID has only exacerbated.

Professors were also a natural target for student frustration during the pandemic. After all, they were the single point of official school contact via squares on a computer.

“Faculty are expected to bring in grant funding for their own research. Research flatlined during COVID. You have your research team, you have your lab, and all of a sudden, you can’t do any of it. If another university is managing to do it, then you are at a competitive disadvantage,” he said. “And funding is an issue that has gotten worse since then because of the rise in costs. So, they also have a financial pressure that’s a barrier to the tenure process. We lost someone recently because they couldn’t get funding for their research. Being a faculty member in the sciences is like being a small business owner.”

Wellness in the sciences and beyond

The sciences have unique pressures, based on funding and research-related outcomes. This in part prompted eLife, a global nonprofit committed to improving the way research is reviewed and communicated, to undertake a 2020 report on mental health in academia. The report focused on those who support colleagues struggling with their mental health. Of 1,500 faculty members surveyed at varying roles and levels of seniority, two-thirds of respondents said they had supported two or more coworkers who were struggling. Of those who identified as being early-career research academics, 47% said they were struggling with their own mental health at the same time. Of more senior respondents, nearly 25% said they were struggling themselves.

“I am repeatedly frustrated by my (often male) colleagues’ stated belief that ‘there is no mental health problem’ at our institution,” wrote one female mid-career respondent in the survey. “They don’t know about it because their trainees come to me, not to them, with their issues. I receive no institutional recognition for this role.”

In an essay that accompanied the report, an associate professor at the Brain Mind Institute at the Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne in Lausanne, Switzerland wrote with striking honesty about the stress and mental health challenges that contributed to two heart attacks. He was not yet 50 years old.

“As young scientists taking on a faculty position, we quickly transition from being a team member to a team leader; from never worrying about securing funding to being overwhelmed with grant deadlines; from managing a single project to planning and guiding the work and careers of several students and post-docs; from worrying about ourselves to being absorbed in worrying about everything except our wellness. The great majority of us have never developed a course or taught classes on our own, yet we are all expected to assume these responsibilities,” wrote Hilal A. Lashuel, associate professor and director of the Laboratory of Molecular and Chemical Biology of Neurodegeneration.

“The life of a professor is a constant balancing act, where we try to juggle personal and professional responsibilities under the pervasive stress of managing expectations in an often hypercompetitive culture. There is always a fear that we may drop the ball, a sense that if that were to happen, we would be alone and the only one to blame,” he said.

Climbing with no clear footing

Achieving tenure is, for most professors, the natural progression and Holy Grail. Tenure track positions are hard to secure; they don’t open up very often, and they represent a financial and professional security that’s hard to replicate in other industries. And yet, it’s an elusive and constantly moving target. This is why, COVID aside, it’s a career path paved with unusually high stress and unpredictability.

“The importance of tenure can’t be overstated. That sort of freedom is remarkable. Pre-tenure, your entire life is centered on getting tenure, in terms of your research, however that’s defined. That is the central focus of your life. Everything counts, but you never know exactly what the bar is, even if it’s explained to you. There are no real guarantees,” explained one music department chair at a highly selective university. “It’s ultimately a question of how you are viewed by other people in your field. What’s your personal reputation? And it really has very little to do with your teaching, per se. If you are an amazing researcher and a terrible teacher, you will still get tenure. If you’re a mediocre researcher and a wonderful teacher, you will not get tenure.”

Or, as another professor put it, once you have tenure, you’re free to finally speak your mind.

But the shine on tenure is seeing some tarnish these days, with the nation’s political climate impacting freedom of speech in academia. Even back in 2013, Kroll included it on his Top 10 list for Forbes, and he said it’s even more true today.

“We cannot take care of our students if we do not learn how to take care of ourselves.”

“The political climate is attacking academic freedoms, minimizing the protections of tenure. Universities are finding ways of getting rid of people whose views they don’t agree with,” Kroll said. “I know faculty members who’ve decided they’d rather work in the private sector for that reason.”

If you are a faculty member who then gets asked to be a department head, you have an entirely new learning curve ahead—and you are largely on your own. Learning to become an administrator is not something professors are born knowing how to do, and there’s rarely instruction or mentoring.

“Becoming an administrator is an entirely different skill set in a career where you’re not trained to do this,” explained the music department chair. “Suddenly, overnight, you’re a manager. The first couple of years I made mistakes, or just approaches that were not productive, so I’ve learned what does and what does not work. Truly on-the-job training. Some larger departments are able to have associate chairs and steps to start to train their faculty. But if you’re a small department, you usually don’t have that option.”

His learning curve included a lot of travel for fundraising, a lot of communication around the Black Lives Matter and Me Too movements, and being the department’s point person on about 40 cases in litigation, going back through events of the past 15 years. “As luck would have it, for me, there were additional stressors that are particular to this moment in history, even before the pandemic. I was completely burned out, and I was overdue for a break,” he said. He ended up taking an emergency sabbatical. “A lot of hard aspects of teaching have nothing to do with teaching. And it wears you down.”

Supportive solutions

Many institutions continue to offer expanded and innovative mental health benefits and services to faculty and administration—though unlike students, in most cases, they need to travel beyond the campus to take advantage of them. It’s not as if a professor is likely to sit elbow-to-elbow with their students in the Counseling and Psychological Services (CAPS) office, waiting to meet with a counselor who is their own colleague at the school. Some universities have changed their offerings to include an in-house Employee Assistance Program (EAP), or a personalized referral service to identify local counselors who have strength in a desired specialty.

But the most pressing request identified by the BUSPH survey is for training in being an effective supporter, as 73% of faculty say they would welcome additional professional development on the topic of student mental health. Responses make clear that faculty feel a responsibility to help students dealing with mental health concerns, which contradicts a long-held assumption that faculty do not see this as “their job.” Additionally, peer support and ambassador programs that involve training staff and faculty would help them recognize and respond to mental health crises in their colleagues.

But at the end of the day, it’s up to the individual to be willing to reach out for help.

“As faculty, we cannot take care of our students,” wrote Hilal A Lashuel of Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, “if we do not learn how to take care of ourselves.”

A Public Health Approach to the Campus Mental Health Crisis

Posted on July 17, 2023August 29, 2023 by Kevin

The numbers are startling. Mental health challenges among United States college students increased by more than 100% in eight years, with the largest increase seen among non-white students, according to a recent study by the Healthy Minds Network. And, while the good news is that more students are seeking help and the stigma around mental illness is slowly fading, demand for support services far outpaces supply, particularly for students of color.

As president of American University (AU), these numbers keep me up at night. I don’t have to look at the data to know that mental health challenges can impact every aspect of our students’ lives. I see these impacts across our campus every day, and I know others are experiencing similar trends on campuses across our nation.

If we’re going to create and implement long-term solutions that address both the supply and the demand issues, we need to apply the same three-pronged approach we have used in other public health crises: prevention, detection, and response.

At the same time, we must ensure we’re differentiating what services are needed throughout every stage of our approach by understanding the unique needs of each individual student, and by accurately assessing their situation to provide an appropriate level of care.

At AU, our approach to prevention begins with a comprehensive focus on the whole person. Student thriving is a campuswide priority. We ask ourselves: What does our unique population of students need to be healthy physically, mentally, and socially?

If we’re going to create and implement long-term solutions that address both the supply and the demand issues, we need to apply the same three-pronged approach we have used in other public health crises: prevention, detection, and response.

We are finding creative ways to meet those needs in our campus environment—from our 84-acre campuswide arboretum that provides space for our community to gather, engage, and recharge; to our specialty housing communities that bring students together to live and explore a common interest or academic pursuit.

We know that financial challenges cause stress for many of our students. We’re working to address this stress through the Elevate Scholarship Initiative, a philanthropic effort to raise $25 million—matched by another $25 million from the university—to support undergraduate students enrolled at AU who are experiencing financial hardships.

And we’re working to create a sense of inclusion and belonging throughout our community to ensure that our students have support networks that both help to counter feelings of loneliness and depression and provide opportunities to seek, and find, assistance.

We believe that detection must be a community effort—our Care Network empowers all AU community members to identify students experiencing mental health and other challenges and help them access the assistance they need.

And, as part of our strategic focus on scholarship, learning, and community, we’re working to address the root causes of this crisis on a macro level. Our faculty are at the cutting-edge of mental health research—from Dr. Terry Davidson’s work with the Center for Behavioral Neuroscience, which is poised to transform our understanding of addiction; to Dr. Kate Gunthert’s work with the Stress and Emotion Lab, which uses intensive daily monitoring techniques to better understand and address symptoms of depression.

We also know that a comprehensive response is important, both in terms of providing timely and effective care, and being thoughtful about what we can do with our resources. Above all, we anchor our response in the idea of the whole student and our values of inclusion.

When students access our services, the first step is a solid initial assessment from a strong clinical team. We offer both individual and group therapy, with specific services for specific populations, such as racially-diverse clinicians who are skilled at providing services to students of color at predominantly white institutions, or through our use of technology to connect our students with a licensed clinician any time of the day or night.

If we are to make progress on this crisis, we need to know what success looks like by asking ourselves crucial questions about growth, responsibility, and accountability. College students need to be supported and challenged to develop intellectually, socially, and morally. The college experience shouldn’t be so overwhelming that our students retreat and ultimately face mental health challenges, or so comfortable that there is no incentive to grow.

And we must embrace the power of communities to act as the ultimate prevention tool—study after study has shown that building inclusive communities creates the social connections our students need to develop resiliency, be challenged and supported, and ultimately become the changemakers of tomorrow.

Together, we can learn from today’s numbers and create a new story of mental health and wellness for our students.

Sylvia Mathews Burwell is the 15^th president of American University and the first woman to serve as president. She previously served as Secretary of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and as Director of the Office of Management and Budget.

If not for Nan

Posted on July 17, 2023July 18, 2023 by Kevin

It was unseasonably warm in early April as the first years at Wayland High School trickled into the morning class. The 15-year-olds from suburban Boston were dressed for the 85-degree weather, with girls in unburied denim cutoffs and boys sporting their lacrosse uniforms, untucked jerseys swallowing up the team’s youngest players. Teenage chatter hummed through the room, softening into whispers at the sound of instructions from the day’s guest presenter. Amid the babble, a few stared silently straight ahead.

No one spoke once John began his story. At the front of the classroom, he stood before the band of students, their desks arranged in a wide U-shape around him. At his waist, he held a white stack of paper—his script—although he rarely looked down except to turn the page. He had been about their age when he started abusing drugs, he said. A talented soccer player and actor, he attended Cambridge Rindge and Latin School, one of Massachusetts’ esteemed public high schools—much like Wayland. Many in the room had probably taken the 30-minute drive to his alma-mater to compete in sports matches and debate tournaments. They might have friends who go there.

What started as a tool to socialize more comfortably with his peers quickly became a crutch for John. “I thought substances would give me more control, but they did the opposite,” he said. By the time he realized drugs were his way of coping with symptoms of depression, he felt stuck. He attempted suicide shortly after matriculating at Boston University, waking up in the hospital to find his mother by his bedside. While the two had drifted apart over the course of his substance use challenges, she was there for him throughout his recovery, helping him rediscover passions for fitness, music and drama.

He only wished he reached out sooner. “[My substance use] took some valuable years I could have used to put my life together,” he said. “Remember, asking for help means you are brave.”

Since 2020, 33-year-old John Oxenford has been sharing his recovery story with students of all ages as a Peer Mentor with The NAN Project. Based in Lexington, Mass., the suicide prevention organization hires young people, typically recent high school or college graduates, with a history of mental health challenges to craft narratives about their experiences and present them to audiences across the northeast. This approach aims to elevate discussions of mental health by centering voices of those who have suffered, and begun healing, from emotional issues that continue to burden countless youth today. Peers offer what they wish they had known about mental health and help-seeking to those who have the time, and need, to learn from them.

Peer-to-peer programming is the flagship work of the NAN Project, founded by Ellen Dalton and Jake Cavanaugh in 2016, after they lost their daughter and younger sister Nancy “Nan” Cavanaugh to suicide in 2012. At 24, Nan died while enrolled in graduate school, a month before she would have earned her Masters of Social Work degree. “The thing was that we were just taken by surprise,” Ellen said of her daughter’s passing. “It seemed like everything was good on the outside.” Despite struggling with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) throughout her life, Nan remained high functioning until the end—a spirited friend, accomplished athlete and honors student.

Ellen believes it was stigma that killed Nan. When Nan’s symptoms of depression and anxiety worsened during high school in Beverly, Mass., her family steered her toward treatment. While she conceded to taking medication, she rejected therapy time and again. Asking for help was always difficult for Nan, Ellen said, due to fear of being judged or ostracized. That fear silenced her so effectively that not even Ellen, who was senior vice president of Eliot Community Human Services, a large Boston-based health nonprofit, could see through the mask. “I know kids. I know mental health. I know behavioral health. And this still sort of slipped through my fingers.”

“The thing was that we were just taken by surprise,” Ellen said of her daughter’s passing. “It seemed like everything was good on the outside.”

Unfortunately, Ellen’s experience happens all too often. Even as stigma around mental health has receded overall, young people dying from suicide and keeping their struggles to themselves remains a disturbing phenomenon. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) latest Youth Risk Behavior Survey shows nearly a quarter of female high schoolers and 12% of male ones reported making a suicide plan. Suicide is the second leading cause of death among college students. This past academic year alone, North Carolina State University lost seven students to suicide and another two to overdoses.

From Nan’s suicide came her family’s commitment to creating space for young people to talk about mental health and become comfortable asking for help. The prevalence of suicide among teens shocked Ellen, she said, “because back then, we didn’t talk about it. That was the ‘S-word.’ And even mental health was not something that people felt safe talking about.” As she and her son Jake strove to cut through the discomfort that shrouded what few discussions of suicide and mental health she found did exist, Ellen said they wondered, “How do we start the conversation and bring it above a whisper?”

The decision to pursue a peer-to-peer model emerged from a series of consultations with professionals, including teachers, school counselors and other clinical experts, as well as focus groups with students. Nan’s brother Jake, who is now the executive director of The NAN Project, said he and his mother Ellen met with “whoever would sit down with us.” Through their research, they began to pick up on what strategies and voices could carry the most weight or promise the greatest impact. “It just became clear that the way to do that is not an adult standing up there saying, ‘This is what you need to know,’” Ellen said. “It was peers talking to students.”

Not everyone shared Ellen’s confidence. “It was really banging on doors,” Jake said of early efforts to spread their message, which often didn’t take. School officials expressed concerns about exposing young people to conversations about mental health. One principal told Ellen that Peers from The NAN Project could present to his students so long as no one ever uttered the word “suicide.” “Well, that’s why we have such a huge problem on our hands,” she said.

The founders caught a break in the summer of 2016, when, through Ellen’s connections at Eliot Community Human Services, she made contact with staff at Everett High School. They were interested in participating in one of The NAN Project’s other programs, professional development workshops, which teach school personnel how to recognize signs of a student in distress and how to respond. From there came an opportunity for the team to put on the first of what has become its signature Peer presentations for members of Everett’s health staff.

Now, The NAN Project has presented to students at around 50 schools, reaching several thousand students annually in recent years. For not only students and educators but caregivers and first-responders, the organization offers a variety of educational programming, including the Peer presentations, professional development workshops and QPR (Question, Persuade, and Refer) suicide prevention training. For young people who may need additional support beyond a one-time Peer visit, there are also SEL (Social-Emotional Learning) Circles, a six-week curriculum run by Peer Mentors and a licensed mental health clinician.

“We’re at the point where we’re getting calls every week. Can you do this for my community group? Can you come into this school?” Ellen said. She credits the traction to the influence of the Peer presentations. “It’s about the young people telling their story to young people and making that connection and allowing the students to open up about their questions or their thoughts. It’s amazing the conversations that go on after these Peer Mentors present their stories.”

“Remember, asking for help means you are brave.”

The Peer presentations have remained largely the same since their inception. For finding Peers, the primary recruiting source continues to be the Department of Mental Health, specifically its own Peer Mentor training program, called Gathering Inspiring Future Talent (GIFT). NAN Peers then start by participating in a four-day training course to help them craft their “comeback stories.” These are the hope-forward narratives that track the origins of their mental health challenges and their paths to finding and maintaining recovery. To appeal to each of the various age groups, the Peers pen multiple iterations of their stories.

The impact their presentations can have on students is also what keeps long-time Peers like Lizzie MacLellan part of the fold. Lizzie, now assistant director of the organization, joined the team right after receiving her undergraduate degree in psychology from University of Massachusetts Boston. Five years later, she sticks with this work, in part because of how she’s seen her story of anxiety, panic attacks, and self-harm resonate with young people. “I’ve had a number of experiences where a student afterwards made a beeline to me and, in some cases, is physically reaching out and being like, ‘You are me. Oh my God, you just said everything that I’m thinking all the time,” she said.

“What we’re going through is a really common thing and so many people go through it. But you don’t know until you hear somebody else say it. And in those situations I’ve been able to say, ‘Okay, well, you heard what I just said—that I wish I had reached out to somebody sooner. Who do you talk to?’” Lizzie said. Sometimes, she’s comforted to hear that the student who connected with her already has a support system in place. Other times, she ends up making the “warm handoff” to a school counselor, who tells her later that no one knew the child in question had been struggling.

Another draw of working at The NAN Project is the unique support system that comes with it. “Something we pitch to the Peers is you become part of a community of folks who’ve been through similar things, but, unlike working at Stop & Shop, you’ll get support as part of that,” Nan’s brother Jake said. Given that mental health challenges brought them all together, they not only don’t need to hide their pasts but find solidarity in them. Clinical director Donna Kausek even performs regular clinical check-ins with the Peers. According to Jake, “If they have to step back because they’re having a tough day or anxious, we get that, and that’s perfectly okay, whereas some work places might not be quite as accommodating.”

Still, it’s important that Peers have reached a point in their recovery where they can handle sharing the rawness of their background. Donna said the main criteria she looks for in aspiring Peers are twofold: whether they’re far enough along in the healing process to deliver their story and whether they have support systems in place to help. After all, logistical issues can crop up from a policy of accommodation for staff when they have a bad day or need a break. “There’s no repercussions for that ever, but it also means that they call out all the time,” Jake said. “That’s why I pay them 50 bucks just to show up [to each presentation].”

For John Oxenford, the presenter at Wayland, the ten hours per week he works as a Peer Mentor for The NAN Project are an opportunity to nurture his longtime love of acting—with one major difference. “It’s not like doing the monologue. It’s like being on a team. So I can connect with these people, and we all support each other so that everything can go well and we can help people,” he said. “Rather than worrying so much about what I do, I can also rely on some people around me.”

“Especially when a kid really connects with it on a personal level, it’s so empowering,” Lizzie said. “It’s almost like every time you say your story, you get to say, ‘And that’s not me anymore.’”

“What we show them is light at the end of the tunnel,” John said.

Anxious to Launch

Posted on July 17, 2023July 19, 2023 by Kevin

Almost without exception, they felt ready to leave college. Notwithstanding all the nerves and nostalgia, of which there were plenty, the recent graduates, now between six months and five years out, could recall at least some part of themselves that had been looking forward to the next phase.

Many had outgrown the behaviors that used to excite them, like drinking and going to parties. For others, the tipping point came as social tensions, having bubbled up during the last few semesters, finally boiled over. One was exhausted after spending four years as a first-generation student navigating higher ed without a blueprint. Another was just eager to jump into his career.

As ready as they imagined themselves for the next chapter, these young graduates would all come to miss certain comforts of the college experience before long. The real world, they found, also without exception, could be a rude awakening. And while “commencement” has always brought its share of anxiety, Gen Z grads have faced a confluence of challenging dynamics, including untested pandemic-related norms and the financial pressures of an inflated, uncertain economy. Where they fall on the graduation preparedness scale may determine their ability to make it beyond the “bubble” of higher education.

Harvard College graduate Wiley Schubert-Reed felt like adulthood claimed him overnight and without warning. “I felt pretty good about graduating, and I still feel pretty good about it,” he said, with an imminent “but” about to follow: He’s been finding himself weighed down by the transition from pursuing a physics degree to chasing solo musical aspirations in New York City, and yearning for the certainty and structure of Cambridge, Massachusetts’ hallowed halls.

A year since leaving college, Wiley continues to grapple with the liminal space he occupies between childhood and adulthood and wonders what makes it so confusing for him and many of his friends. Maybe the COVID-19 pandemic distorted his generation’s sense of time, or maybe it’s that he’s still living at home in the same city and house where he grew up. “I feel like the line of growing up is a little bit more obscure now than it was before,” he said. “I think my parents graduated from school and moved to the city and became adults. I don’t feel that way.”

However different the anxieties of college are compared to those of the “afterlife,” the question stands as to whether soon-to-be-grads tend to leave school with an adequate understanding of what awaits them on the other side.

Wiley’s experience mirrors that of many of his peers. The end of college brought the end of a slew of academic and social-related stressors he was keen to shed. It also created space for a whole new set of issues to crop up, and fester. “It definitely ebbed and flowed,” Wiley said of his mental health in college. “But it was far less existential than I think the things influencing my mental health are now.” The forces that controlled the Brooklynite’s mood as recently as a year ago, like homesickness or disgruntlement with his major, seem silly to him at this point. After all, college, and all the problems that came with it, had an endpoint, unlike in “real life.” “Now, it’s like this chapter is ending when I die,” he explained. “Now, it’s like everything is for life. Or it feels that way.”

However different the anxieties of college are compared to those of the “afterlife,” the question stands as to whether soon-to-be-grads tend to leave school with an adequate understanding of what awaits them on the other side—the freedoms and uncertainty, excitement and discomfort, self-discovery and, especially, loneliness. Education is often the most consistent form of structure in these students’ lives before they lose it. For all the energy and resources colleges dedicate to teaching students how to conquer academic life, they may be less apt to focus on preparing them to cope with its absence.

While some institutions may dismiss the concept of emotional preparation as “not their job,” taking a hands-off approach could be risky in 2023. In a recent survey on the mental health of recent graduates by the Mary Christie Institute, more than half (51%) of respondents reported needing help for emotional or mental health problems in the past year. More than half (53%) reported feeling burnout at least once per week (where burnout is “a state of prolonged physical and psychological exhaustion, which is perceived as related to the person’s work”). More than one third (39%) said their college did not help them develop skills to prepare them for the emotional or behavioral impact of the transition to the workplace.

Finding Community

“I don’t think it was the worst job in the world, but it certainly was a challenging office,” 27-year-old Ada (whose name has been changed) said of her first job post-college. After graduating from one of her state’s public universities she accepted a position working in a District Attorney’s office. The adjustment proved difficult as she struggled to fit in with her coworkers and find support among them. Actually, she admitted, it was miserable. “Three months, four months, five months after I graduated, I pretty much couldn’t get out of bed. So I had no choice but to seek help if I didn’t want the rest of my life to basically fall apart.”

For Ada, the toxic office environment was a product of some of the people as much as the work itself. By nature, the DA’s office can end up exposing its employees to “horrendous things,” Ada said, probably alluding to violent or disturbing criminal cases. But her stint there also coincided with a height of the Black Lives Matter movement, she said, opening up a dialogue among certain colleagues about police brutality and anti-Black racism. Their commentary didn’t strike Ada, who immigrated with her family from East Africa almost 20 years ago, as work-appropriate. “Being Black with all of these political conversations that are happening in office…” she drifted off. “I think sometimes it’s unfortunate how little people can actually articulate what their state of discomfort with you is.”

While Ada attributed the decline in her mental health after college only in part to her initial job, she experienced a drastic improvement once she’d left. “Surprisingly,” she added with dry amusement. After the DA’s office, she spent two years with a disability advocacy nonprofit, before becoming a program manager of the intercultural education office at a small liberal arts college. If the community at her old job drove her away, the one at her current office is why she sticks around. “I love my work. I love my students. The ones that I get to work with, they make the hard days easy.”

Now that she works in higher education, Ada’s understanding of the support, or lack thereof, for soon-to-be grads stems from her recent experiences as both student and staffer. “We ask students more about what they’re going to do and what their career goals are than if they have built any infrastructure to support themselves mentally when they leave college,” she said. “Because they’re not going to have quick access to their friends. They’re not going to have quick access to a meal, whereas college really does create a bubble and create this life that is really not in the real world.”

For young people at this vulnerable stage, hungry for the kind of social network they built in college, the community they find at work can make or break the larger job experience, especially for those from marginalized backgrounds. In 2022, 25-year-old Emma Womack graduated from Amarillo College, a community college in Amarillo, Texas, with two degrees in welding and machining and wary of being a woman in a male-dominated field. The Texan, hailing from Bushland, had been the only woman in her welding program and one of two in the machining program. When she started job searching, she remembered an unfortunate interview at what she called a “really cool” fabrication company in Austin. “They asked me questions like, ‘Are you aware that you’re going to sweat? Are you aware you’re going to be working outside?’ And then they didn’t even let me take a weld test, whereas if I were a male, they wouldn’t have asked those kinds of questions,” she said. She didn’t accept the job.

As for the position Emma did end up taking, a machinist apprenticeship at Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico, positive social interactions have set it apart. “I have only male bosses, which was a little unnerving. But they’ve all been fantastic. I couldn’t have asked for better bosses honestly,” she said. She credits the ladies’ lunches organized by the company with nurturing a community of women even amid the male environment. There’s also a wellness center and a range of employee resource groups, including for LGBTQ+ people and those affected by addiction. “They have a lot of support here, which is super awesome, because I know a lot of places don’t have that.”

Wiley Schubert-Reed, the Harvard grad, has felt the absence of similar support as he pursues a career as an independent musician. Given the only structure in his life is what he constructs, he often questions whether he’s on the right path, wishing he could tap into the minds of those who charted the waters before him. “Harvard preaches to have this huge, wonderful network of people everywhere,” he said, “but unless it’s the finance world, they’re kind of impossible to get in touch with.” He’s reached out to alumni but rarely hears back, and laments that his alma mater doesn’t play a more formal role in facilitating mentorship opportunities for everyone. “Just to feel like you have some sort of authority figure offering you guidance, like when you have an academic advisor or mentor in school, that could be helpful. And I think that would be helpful for non-artistic people, too.”

Mentors have long been regarded as important influencers for students, particularly in readying them for career. According to Gallup, college graduates are almost two times more likely to be engaged at work if they had a mentor in college who encouraged them to pursue their goals and dreams. Alumni mentorships could be one way to soften the landing for young graduates by providing them the unique perspective of someone recently in their shoes. Given the paucity of formal mentor programs within higher education, the wide proliferation of this “add-on” remains a challenge. Additional research from Gallup shows that less than half of graduates (43%) said they had an undergraduate mentor who encouraged them to pursue their goals. The mentorship gap is even greater for minority graduates, who were 25 percentage points less likely to say they had a faculty mentor than their White peers.

“Oh my God,” he remembered thinking about his first job. “This just sucks. I don’t want to be here, but I have to be here. There’s nothing I can do about it.’”

The need for connection, whether with mentors or peers, became particularly, sometimes painfully apparent to those who started their first jobs during the COVID-19 pandemic. When 26-year-old Sophie (whose name has been changed) graduated from Texas A&M University, she kicked off her new job at an audit advisory firm online, living and working from her childhood home west of Houston. Her employer, whom she connected with through a career fair during her senior year, won her over thanks to an on-site visit. “The office visit was so cool, and all the people were so fun and nice,” she said. “Funny enough, I never got to go to the office until way later.” There were days in the first months of her job during which she never spoke to another employee.

Coming from college, which Sophie remembered as a hub of constant interaction, the self-proclaimed extrovert had expected to be more social when her job started. “It definitely affected me personally because I wanted more out of work than just sitting behind a computer creating massive Excel models.” Once she started working in-person, building relationships in the office became easier, not to mention valuable in the face of long hours, competitive coworkers, and high-pressure evaluations. Still, after three years, she said she’s considering a career shift, having grown tired of crunching numbers to make clients happy, rather than investing in a mission she truly believes in. “The only thing that really keeps you there is the connections you make at the company,” she explained.

What’s the Purpose?

The compounded effect of not being particularly interested in his line of work and not having a community to compensate was enough to send 25-year-old Michael running from his job in tech sales. “In my first job, there was a point where I dreaded waking up and logging on my computer just because I hated it so much. I hated everything about it,” he said. As a senior, Michael recalled being so focused on finding a job—intent on earning a salary, moving into his own apartment, and diving into the next chapter—that he didn’t think long or hard about what kind of job would suit him. He now encourages seniors to carefully consider who they are and what they’re passionate about before selecting a job for the sake of it or because their friends are pursuing something similar.

“Oh my God,” he remembered thinking about his first job. “This just sucks. I don’t want to be here, but I have to be here. There’s nothing I can do about it.’”

Even having moved on to a second job he enjoys more, Michael said he’s still coming to terms with the less-than-fuzzy reality of the corporate world. “I figured it was just going to be similar to college, but in a different, more mature way. That was not the case. It was very different. You’re just kind of a number.” He often only sees colleagues through his computer screen and imagines they only care about him insofar as he makes money for the company. Although his exhaustion has changed since the pandemic, when managing to get out of bed was a feat, he continues to worry about the sustainability of his career. “I wouldn’t say it’s burnout where I feel like, ‘ I can’t go on with this.’ I think it’s more of an existential, ‘What am I doing? How long am I gonna be doing this? At what point does this change?’”

Michael may have benefitted from more structured encouragement to contemplate what career would best suit him. Some colleges have begun providing these forums for students to figure out how to ‘align who they are with what they do.’ At Bates College, for example, the Center for Purposeful Work has pioneered helping students mull over their “purpose” and identify work that brings them meaning through curricular infusion models, practitioner-taught courses, internships, and job shadowing. Even if these experiences do not expose the students to promising fields of interest, they learn to pivot to new opportunities.

“Aligning your work with your interests, strengths, and values gives you the agency you need to make the right career decisions, those that will bring you meaning and purpose in your life, which we know is a significant driver of wellbeing,” Clayton Spencer, who recently stepped down as president of Bates, said.

In 2018, Bates partnered with Gallup on a survey in which 80% of college graduates said deriving a sense of purpose from their work was extremely important (43%) or very important (37%). Yet less than half of these graduates had succeeded in finding it. Likewise, the study showed that graduates with high purpose in work are almost ten times more likely to have high overall well-being.

“I think especially with a good college degree, it’s pretty easy to find ways to make money,” Wiley continued. “The question is more, can you find ways to make money via what you feel passionate about as well?”

The decision to abandon a promising career that becomes mentally or emotionally damaging isn’t always straightforward. The comparative culture and social pressures to make money often intensify outside of college, where many students had access to the same classes, dorms, and dining halls. Off campus, what gym friends belong to or even how much they spend on salads for lunch begins to reflect the kind of job they have and how well they do it, Michael said. “I would say, certainly after the first year and into the second and third, a big part of social connotations is frankly, and this is terrible, but how much money do you make?”

Spencer is quick to emphasize the practical dimensions of Purposeful Work, including financial considerations. “The reflection that lies at the heart of Purposeful Work helps students figure out what they are or are not interested in, what they are or are not good at, and what kinds of work experiences activate their strengths in ways that build excitement and a sense of momentum. Students also see adults in the workplace whose choices reflect a series of value-based judgments about how important financial concerns are to the kind of life they wish to live.”

Ada, who comes from a low-income background, said the promise of a higher salary swayed her decision to leave a job she loved. Learning to manage money continues to be an uphill climb for her. “I think coming from low income means you know how to stretch $20 into $200. So there’s that, but that’s not really money management, that’s just making do with what you’ve got,” she said. “To be honest, even at 27, I’m still learning about money. I don’t really know money.” Her basic approach involves ensuring all the necessities get paid for on time and “then dealing with the rest.”

“What people don’t really understand with first-gen is there isn’t anyone to turn to and be like, ‘Hey, how do I budget this?’ How do I create a spreadsheet?’ There isn’t anyone,” Ada continued. Whether from a first-generation background like Ada or supported by a mom who works for a tax filing company like Sophie, the path to financial literacy for young professionals can seem never-ending and discouraging. When the Mary Christie Institute polled young professionals about their mental health last year, nearly half (46%) reported their financial situation was always or often stressful. Financial stress also correlated with overall mental health, as nearly two-thirds (61%) of respondents with more financial stress said their mental health was fair or poor, compared to under one-third (31%) of those with less financial stress.

Many colleges offer financial literacy programs. Whether students have the foresight to seek them out before graduation or know they exist is an issue. At Stanford University, the Mind Over Money financial wellness program offers free financial coaching and online learning modules. At Texas Tech University, students pursuing personal financial planning degrees offer guidance to their peers through the Red to Black financial coaching program. Yet, Inside Higher Ed’s Student Voice survey last year indicates more than two-thirds (67%) of student respondents were “not sure what is offered” in the way of personal finance education at their institution.

Accepting a tighter budget is a compromise many who lead with their passion may be forced to make. Wiley has confronted this reality as he pursues a less secure line of work in the arts. Saving on rent by living with his parents and earning a salary from his second job keep him feeling like money-related concerns hold him back from socializing. Long-term uncertainty plagues him. “I’m happy to spend two or three years struggling and figuring stuff out, but what if in five years, my friends stay at their corporate companies and are making millions of dollars a year and my art doesn’t go anywhere and now I literally have zero income or prospects?” he asked aloud.

“I think especially with a good college degree, it’s pretty easy to find ways to make money,” Wiley continued. “The question is more, can you find ways to make money via what you feel passionate about as well?”

Working through questions with such life-altering consequences is ultimately up to the individual, as these young people have all acknowledged. The take-away for higher education may simply be providing the opportunities, the support, and the experiences to do so.