Regents to form group on student mental health

Utah’s higher education governing board announced this week the formation of a working group on student mental health, an effort co-lead by a Utah State University student and member of the Board of Regents.

Ty Aller, a Ph.D student studying family science and human development, a licensed marriage and family therapist and the student representative to the Board of Regents, will join other members of the board and higher education community in an informal working group to work on the issue.

“I think this working group is a direct response from students and different administrators saying this is a problem in the Utah System of Higher Education we need to address; it may seem like a small step, but this is a huge win for the USHE system,” Aller said, referring to the name of the umbrella organization of Utah’s public colleges and universities governed by the board and the Utah higher education commissioner. “We can start understanding how the problem is affecting each one of our campuses individually. Then, we’ll figure out what actionable steps we can take to help students.”

The formation of the regents’ working group comes a few months after the USU Student Association — the school’s student government — declared a “mental health crisis” on campus because of what they see as an alarming number of student suicides and a shortage of school counselors.

In declaring a “mental health crisis,” student government leaders hope to get other student leaders at other higher education institutions to declare a mental health crisis on their campuses to help convince the Legislature to provide more funding for campus mental health resources.

Some USU students, including Aller, have recently indicated the interest in forming a USU NAMI club, or the National Alliance on Mental Illness. NAMI is “the nation’s largest grassroots mental health organization,” according to the organization’s website.

The objectives of the Board of Regents’ working group on mental health are not yet defined, according to Spencer Jenkins, associate commissioner for public affairs with the USHE.

“We’re just at the very front end of this. We know it’s an issue and we want to take more of a look at it at the state level,” Jenkins said. “The working group is going to dive in and see if, from a public policy standpoint, if there are some things higher education needs to do to address the issue.”

The USHE press release announcing the formation of the working group noted the number of students who are in need of help with mental health issues.

In 2013, almost all the college mental health directors surveyed by the National College Counseling Association said they’d seen a recent increase in students with serious psychological problems at their institutions. As student enrollments have increased by about five percent nationally in the past five years, the number of students seeking counseling services has grown over 30 percent.

Jenkins said members of the Board of Regents and the Utah higher education commissioner’s office believe student mental health is “not solely” a higher education issue.

“We’re aware our schools are trying to address this, but there’s maybe a need at the state level to bring some added visibility to it to engage more with other state partners — K-12 schools, the Legislature, health care providers,” Jenkins said.

Aller said the working group’s success is dependent upon bringing together the stakeholders Jenkins mentioned, and outlining “a 1-year, 3-year, 5-year plan to address these types of issues.”

Aller believes the problem of student mental health is “much more complex” than just the number of suicides or number counselors on campus.

“While there are needs to increase access to therapists, I think there are also things students can be doing — creating better social support networks and a more inclusive environment on each one of our campuses,” Aller said. “The conversation to address mental health on campus — suicides, depression, anxiety — needs to take a holistic approach.”