Syracuse University should enhance its mental health services by looking to implement more feasible alternatives and increasing accessibility to resources.

In the last five years, the number of in-person appointments at the Counseling Center has increased by about 66 percent. And in 2014, the only year where psychiatric services were fully staffed at SU, there were 985 visits.

The statistics speak for themselves, and while the current staff is doing its best with the resources it has, SU must catch up to the increasing number of students who need these services.

The current mental health resources in place have been criticized for the long wait times, the way appointments are prioritized and the focus on short-term counseling before referring students to third-party services in the Syracuse community.

If SU is going to provide these resources for students, they must be organized in a way that is efficient in providing students with the services they need in a timely manner.

“At the end of the day it’s a bigger task than 17 people in this building can tackle,” said Cory Wallack, the Counseling Center director.

When staff members at the Counseling Center have made it clear that the office is understaffed, the university needs to make the accessibility of mental health services on campus a priority.

After the suicides of six students in the 2009–10 school year, Cornell University revamped its mental health services and implemented several programs for students on its campus. These programs include “Let’s Talk” and the Empathy Assistance and Referral Service, a student-run project that provides peer-to-peer support from trained students.

Like Cornell, SU should look to peer-to-peer advising when looking for a cost-effective way to make therapy options accessible and comfortable for students. Students on campus are clearly invested in the issue of mental health services, as reflected in the coordination of the “Send Silence Packing” event on the Quad earlier this week. This could supplement current mental health services while the university weighs its options for staffing, which will require time and deliberation.

SU should not implement these resources as a reaction to the lost lives of students, but should take preventative and precautionary measures.

Published on April 22, 2015 at 11:38 pm