From WXXI news.

This is Connections.

I'm Evan Dawson.

Well, Connections is on the road today live from the little theater.

We're focusing on the issue of mental health on college campuses.

Many colleges and universities have invested in more mental health supports for students in recent years.

This hour, we examine what is working and what is not.

Some schools have added 24/7 telehealth services.

Same day walk in counseling.

Crisis intervention teams.

Digital wellness apps.

Faculty training programs.

Others are focused on the issue of academic stress and emphasize alternative grading models.

In the past generation, the number of American college students who self-report mental health concerns has exploded.

The Healthy Mind Study surveyed more than 84,000 college students.

Here's some of what they found.

69% of college students self-reported a mental or behavioral health concern in the past year.

That is far higher than their same age peers who don't attend college.

37% of students screened positive for depression.

33% of students screened positive for moderate to severe anxiety disorders.

11% of students reported seriously considering suicide within the past year.

And if you look at past generations, all of those numbers are up.

So 25 years ago, the number of students on college campuses who were screening positive for depression was around 10 to 11%.

So again, it's now 37%.

The number of students who experienced suicidal ideation a generation ago was about 8 to 9%.

Now it's 11%.

Critics argue that schools have done maybe too much or not focusing enough on resilience, but many schools counter they are simply responding to students who are more likely to express their needs than in generations past.

We'll welcome feedback from our live audience coming up.

First, let me introduce our panelist.

We're glad to have a student here.

Giulianna Volpe is a psychology major at Finger Lakes Community College.

Welcome.

Thank you for being here.

Thank you for having me today.

Let me welcome Darlene Schmitt, who's director of the Counseling Center at Suny Brockport, celebrating 23 years at Suny Brockport today.

Happy anniversary.

Thank you so much.

And welcome as well to Doctor Becca Morris.

Becca is vice president for Campus Life and dean of students at Hobart William Smith Colleges.

Welcome to the program.

Thank you for being here.

Thanks for having me.

And let me tell the audience here, we're glad to have these folks on stage.

Please welcome our guests.

Audience.

So I want to start with just some quick general comments, from, the campuses.

And then we're going to have a student perspective, because I think Giulianna's voice is really, really important here.

So, Becca, I'll start with you at Hobart and William Smith, you've been there 17 years.

17.

How much has the issue of mental health on campus changed in that time?

I think it's changed quite a lot.

If we think about what happened in 2010, the birth of Facebook, the birth of social media, Instagram, all of those things contribute to what you cited earlier from the Healthy Mind survey, the increase of, self awareness of competition, of, depression, anxiety, all those things.

And colleges are responding to it.

I think a fantastic experience with the therapist at the school at the time.

And how quickly did they respond to you?

I was basically able to just make an appointment.

So it was basically I just had to find an opening, which I believe was within the next couple days, I believe.

So it was pretty quick.

And yeah, I had the session with her and I was able to just talk about, you know, different things that I've experienced in the past.

And, you know, where the thoughts came from.

And she was just there to listen and to provide guidance when needed.

And it was it was very much needed.

It was very helpful.

I don't have the same therapist currently as she ended up leaving and going somewhere else.

So I got transferred to another therapist who's also amazing and who also helps me through a lot of different things.

But, yeah, during that experience, you definitely noticed, sorry, I definitely noticed that, the thoughts have decreased significantly.

And I think the help of being able to talk about it and realizing, like, these things in the future are going to happen, but it's figure out, you know, and something specific is, after I got my license at the end of that semester, I then spent the next year trying to look for a car, which was very stressful because this economy for cars like the car market right now is insane.

You know, I would see cars for 130,000 miles.

They were asking for like 12 grand for it, you know, like, it's really hard to find something good.

But after looking a long time, I at least felt like a long time.

I was able to find the perfect car.

It was under 100,000 miles.

It was under ten grand.

And it gets me from point A to point B and I. I found it accidentally, actually.

So, like, you know, that's an example of how I was able to see that things are going to work out.

The car is like a symbol of this is a piece that's been stressful, but if I'm patient it's going to be okay.

Yes.

Yeah.

And so how do you feel about the future now?

Because what you're describing was a feeling of of overwhelm and feeling like the future is going to be very difficult to arrive at because of all these pressures and challenges.

You know, I talked to you for a while for the program, but you seem pretty optimistic about the future.

Yeah, yeah.

And I still am.

You know, I'm still worried a little bit about just how much things are going to cost.

But I am a PTK member.

And so we get automatic admission to different schools and scholarships and I also qualify.

I've been able to qualify for a decent amount of financial aid.

So I think just kind of having to remember that, and knowing that those things are there to be to help, that's, that's something that helps me kind of, you know, like, okay, everything is going to be okay.

And I'm still going, you know, if I can keep up with these good grades and everything, then it'll definitely pay off.

I don't mean to be trite.

I'm.

I'm genuinely curious to know if if the fact that everyone in this room has been worried about the cost of stuff for a while.

And does that help you knowing that, you know, you're certainly not the only one dealing with that.

Yeah, definitely.

I mean, I think of how lucky I am that I have access to these things.

I mean, I have access to education in general.

You know, some places around the world don't.

And so, yeah, you know, I have access to financial aid.

I have I don't live that far away from the campus.

So commuting isn't, you know, that far?

And so.

Yeah.

I'm sorry, what was the question?

You're nailing it, Giulianna.

In fact, I hope the audience appreciates that someone can come on stage and tell this story publicly.

It's pretty remarkable.

It's important to be able to hear it.

So what would your message be to college and university leaders across the country as they try to figure out what's the right as we were just talking about Darlene, what's the right combination of services for students?

What do you what would you want them to understand?

The.

That having the accessibility to mental health services is incredibly important because, you know, we do need to manage our work.

I mean, I haven't had any experiences with professors where they won't give extensions for assignments, which I'm very grateful for.

I think that's very helpful, you know, because different things happen.

And so I think it's it's nice to have that flexibility of, okay, I'm going to try my hardest to get this done.

But if something happens, I know that, you know, my professor will be understanding.

And so I think just remembering that, but also keeping a balance between okay, you can have, you know, this extension.

But then also let's provide these services for you.

So that way you can, you know, talk about whatever it is you're dealing with and gain some sort of strategy.

So that way you can still continue to get your work done.

Yeah, that makes sense.

I think that's also Darlene Schmitt.

What do you hear in this story from Giulianna?

Well, first of all, I hear a lot of courage.

And, I'm very grateful that you were willing to share that story, because I don't think it's it's one that we haven't heard.

We hear a lot.

And a lot of students come in and they say, you know, it would be better if I wasn't here, or if I wasn't here, I wouldn't have to deal with all of these stressors, that anticipatory anxiety.

That's real.

Right?

There's real things in everything you're saying.

It's a scary world and there's so much unknown.

And I think I'm happy that you found the right fit for a therapist who can help you navigate that, and that you're also learning by experience to trust yourself, that you trust yourself, too.

Yep.

This is distressing and it's unknown, but I know from past experience I can get through it and it'll be okay.

Yeah.

Even though it doesn't feel it sometimes.

Yes.

So, Doctor Morris, what do you hear in the story?

Yeah, I'm hearing the, the skill development of being able to go from being overwhelmed to just being whelmed, like some things we can reduce and say, this is an anxiety that other people are feeling.

And we have to remember college students, the cost of fuel at $4 a gallon or something.

Some of us might the rest of us in the room might say, well, it was $4 back in 2010.

That lasted a few a year or so.

So maybe the fuel prices will go down.

But someone who's 17, 18, my kid is 17.

Just learning to drive.

Is this what it's going to be like?

And so that anticipatory anxiety, we have to teach people to understand that the narrative that they're experiencing and understand how to vocalize their feelings and get services, whether that's immediate crisis counseling, which many colleges campuses have overnight.

Right.

So you call specific number, you get connected to a live person, particularly if it's a life threatening emergency.

And then you have that walk in time the next day.

All of that is helped by the skill development that we can also be doing.

Yeah.

Well said.

So after we take this only wealth, we got two very short breaks.

The only break of the first half hour is very quick.

And then we're going to come back.

We're going to invite audience questions and comments if you have them.

We've got a live audience with us at the Little Theater today as we talk about mental health on college campuses.

And we're going to talk more about, what our guests on stage are doing on their campuses and what's happening and the kind of developments they would want the community to know about.

We'll talk about different kinds of legislation and support from New York State that have come through, and a lot more with our guests.

We're right back on Connections.

Support for your public radio station comes from our members and from Mary Carolla Center, supporting residents to become active members of the community, from developing life skills to gaining independence.

Mary Carey, Yola center Transforming Lives of People with disabilities More online at.

Mary Carey, ola.org.

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Join us later today for live special coverage.

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From NPR news.

This is Connections.

I'm Evan Dawson.

We're glad to be at the little theater.

It's kind of a home game for us.

Of course, WXXI partnered with the The Little Theater, one of the great places in Rochester.

We've got a wonderful live audience here, and we're looking to be in your community.

So if you have ideas where you want us, take the show on on the road in the future.

Find us at Connections at wxxi.org.

So let me turn to Doctor Morris and Darlene Schmitt for a little bit more about what's happening on campuses now.

So Doctor Morris, is there is there something that's happening for students that when if they walk in the door, if they're touring campus and they've got the kind of questions or ideas that Giulianna was talking about, if if I need the support, is it there?

What's the first thing you point to?

Yeah.

So I would say that is absolutely something that people are asking on.

They are.

So ten years ago it might be something that a parent might take us.

Admissions counselor or student tour guide aside and say, what type of services do you have?

This is now part of the campus tour in a way.

Right?

It's something that we very much talk about and particularly us as a Jed campus, meaning that over the last five years we went through an analysis of what what what do people know about our services?

What are our current students know?

Do they know how to reach someone?

Do they feel like this is an accepting place where people will, provide support when needed?

And through that analysis, we now have a commitment to 24 765 some sort of way, some sort of counseling, whether that's crisis counseling, remote counseling or in person counseling.

We have counselors that are here that provide, counseling on our campus in the evenings and weekends outside of the normal business hours, because students are taking class during the during the academic week.

Right.

Or they're athletes and they're participating in, in practice or game.

So expanding those hours and that availability, has helped us meet the need of more and more students.

About 20% of our students will seek counseling at some point during the year.

In addition to all that, I think the skill development, we have a course called Personal Empowerment that, about 20% of all students take at some point during their academic career.

Teaches all the skills you were talking about.

Darlene.

Emotional regulation, identifying your feelings.

We start each class with, how are you feeling and where is it coming from?

Everyone says good in week one.

By the end of the week, 15 people are using, you know, I'm feeling disappointed or I'm feeling anxious or I'm feeling proud of myself.

Getting people to talk about those things in a non-clinical setting normalizes and destigmatize getting help when needed.

How did the men doing that?

We have more men in personal empowerment than others, I think.

It's actually a space where it's funny.

We mentioned we've talked about grades, right?

Personal empowerment is a different type.

Of course, it's credit or no credit.

So your participation is what gives you the credit for that course.

And they learn to use different words.

They they use a lot of sports examples and I'm fine with that.

I don't know what they're talking about half the time.

But we'll we'll get there.

Darling, do you agree with Doctor Morris that, that the campus tour, this is more likely to come up now than it was a generation ago?

100%.

We do open houses for prospective students and accepted students.

And our table is when I say table, we are all all the resources, all the departments on campus are in one space, and parents and prospective students can come and ask questions.

And our table is always busy.

I do get the mom and the student that pull us aside, but I think it's a big recruitment tool for our admissions folks to sort of brag about the type of support that's offered at Brockport.

We have, the syncope well, at Brockport.

And as I mentioned, we really take a look at all of the eight dimensions of wellness.

And we try to provide accessible, you know, programs, whether if it's an intramural sports, if, if that's a physical health and recreation need or the counseling similar to Becca, we have, access to 24 over 765 care through our partners at Timely Care for students, 12 months a year.

They can do counseling, they can talk to someone for crisis support.

So I think that, we're trying our best to educate faculty and staff and what it looks like to support a student.

It used to be that if a student was in tears, they'd walk them over to the counseling center.

Always.

Now we're teaching them to just just be present in the moment and to recognize when you need to make the referral versus always just sending them.

I think that's counterintuitive.

I think what you're describing goes against some of the assumptions that maybe some of the cynics or critics would have, which is that everything is being turned into a mental health challenge as opposed to what you're describing.

Hey, we do have a counseling center and you may need it, but you may actually you may not.

Right there may be resilience strategies before you walk in the door there.

Exactly.

And we do offer things other than, you know, yes, we do the therapeutic work with the clinicians, do a great job with that.

But we offer workshops and groups and we do outreach.

We get out into the campus community where our students are.

They get to know us.

We bring things to teach in a fun way, so that they know that we're there if they need us.

But they also have, access to, like, the tools that we're trying to push out for all of our students so that they can, you know, navigate this really challenging time more effectively.

We heard from New York State Senator Summer Brooks office about the Student Lifeline Act, which was enacted into law in July of 25 last year, co-sponsored by Senator Brouk and in the Assembly, Assembly Member Sarah Clarke.

It requires colleges and universities in New York State to include the 908 Suicide Crisis, Lifeline, and the Crisis Text Line at 741741, and all student ID cards, and to provide a direct connect to culturally competent care.

And the senator's office says that the Student Lifeline Act was formed as a direct response to student feedback and centering youth voices in the mental health conversation.

Has it had an impact?

Yes.

So that that, that act required all new ID cards to have just nine, eight, eight in the text information.

I think a lot of colleges like AWS went a step further.

We provided it to every we reprinted every single card, every single faculty and staff member got a brand new card.

And on the back isn't just the 908 information, but also a QR code that brings, whoever's scanning that to mental health resources on our campus.

And so far this fall semester, 70 unique people have you know, I can't tell if it's a faculty or staff member or a student have scanned that code in the last month to get those resources.

That means they had to take it out of their pocket, take it out of the holder and find those resources.

And that tells me that people are looking for that support, both formal and informal.

Anything you want to add, Darlene?

No, I, I agree with kind of what you're saying.

I think it's important that it's available to the campus community as a whole, right?

Students, but also the faculty and staff.

We have to pay attention to wellness all the way around.

And student, obviously, we're there for our students, their priority.

But if we're not well ourselves, then we can't always be there for our students in the ways in which they need.

So, Giulianna, let's kind of get a sense for how students are talking about this.

So do you feel comfortable or reticent to talk about, your own life and some of what we've discussed today with peers?

Do you limit it to sort of a closed circle, or is it becoming more common just to talk more about it?

I think I do feel more comfortable to talk about different things.

The different thoughts that I had.

Usually I don't, talk about that too much with people unless it's a conversation that's coming up.

You know, if we're in a classroom or if we're in one of the student hangout spots or whatever you call them, on campus, and it's a conversation that's coming up, then I feel like I would feel comfortable coming out and saying, like, yeah, I've been through this, too.

Yeah.

So I do feel like things have been more normalized.

I do actually hear people, talking about their own experiences sometimes.

Like, sometimes I'll kind of walk by and I'll see that people are, you know, talking about it, or I'll be in a room doing homework and they'll be talking about different things, you know, next door, like that actually happened a few days ago.

So, I don't know, maybe maybe it's becoming more normalized.

At least I would hope so.

I want to give you an impression I have, and I want you to tell me if you think I'm right or wrong.

So one of my impressions is that the conversation in general about mental health is much more open and healthy than it was even when I was growing up.

But the presence of social media allows for a real sort of cruelty at times.

If people want to weaponize it, that way.

And so you have sort of the progress that comes with this evolving conversation and the sort of social discourse.

But then social media allows people to just be, I think awful at times.

And so I don't know how that balances out.

What do you say?

I mean, I'm not on social media all the time, so I want to stand up and applaud right.

I yeah, I, I've never downloaded Instagram.

I downloaded TikTok one time and then I had to delete it because I would swipe there and there was no break.

It was legally allowed to delete TikTok.

I, I mean, I was able to do it good steps.

Yeah.

I, I'm actually never even really on Snapchat unless it's to text people.

I don't have their number.

These are conscious choices for you because you don't think there's value for you.

Yeah, I I'm not into it.

Honestly.

So, I do have Facebook, but I downloaded that so I could look for cars, like, it's not I'm not looking at just.

You do have to be over 40 to use regular I second that.

Yeah.

Honestly, the only thing I'm on all the time is Pinterest.

And that's because I look up ideas.

I really am not on anything else, so I don't really I don't always see a lot of cruelty unless I hear about it from other people.

Do you think that your mental health is better because you're not on social?

Very much?

I mean, maybe, but it's kind of hard to say because, you know, I'm never, I've never experienced, you know, like seeing, I don't know, bullying on there or anything.

So it's I feel like I may not be a good example to answer that because I'm not.

It's basically hard to say.

You know, if I was on social media a lot, would I feel more depressed?

And I'm not really sure.

I mean, it's it's possible.

All I know is I'm glad that I'm not on it, in case that's the case.

You know, I, I admire the choice.

And of course, to state the obvious, there's good resources that you can find on social media.

Different platforms have a lot of good things going on.

Yes.

We actually we're trying to be in all those places as well.

But I think in general, what you're describing is a pretty healthy approach to it.

Thank you.

The right that, and I want to mention as well to the audience here and everyone listening to the program, the production team at Connections and really, producer Megan Mac has put together an outstanding spreadsheet.

We reached out to institutions across our region, and we've put together this spreadsheet.

So if you're wondering, we've got a couple represented on state, on stage today with Hobart William Smith and with Brockport.

Well, if you're wondering what's happening at Alfred or Kuka or University of Rochester or IT or MC, it's all here.

The responses and the spreadsheet that we're talking about, we're going to link in our show notes.

And we've posted a site news.org, so for you to learn much more about what's happening out there, it's a really, really interesting resource to kind of compare.

And I think you'll see some, some similarities because, you know, I don't know, Doctor Morris, if you feel like, in some ways, if you're institutions a leader in this.

But I wonder if you talk often to, to colleagues on different campuses about this.

Yeah, we were just saying thoroughly and I were just saying we've been on zoom calls together over the past few years about what?

What trends are you seeing?

We do see social media as a contributor, I think, to anxiety, not just because of the often intentional messaging and bullying, but, the CDC came out with a study last month that 1 in 3 teenagers are using social media every single hour.

So to be bombarded with even all the good things all your friends are doing when you're at home watching TV with nothing else to do.

I heard of a story the other day from a student who said they were scrolling through Venmo because they had gotten, Venmo from their Venmo payment from their parent, and they noticed that their friends had given each other money for pizza night that they didn't go to.

Right.

So it's these little things that contribute to a sense of anxiety around social media.

You can doomscrolling on Venmo.

Oh, you know, who knew?

But yes, our colleagues, we talk about these things.

What are we seeing?

How is social media impacting what type of services?

You know, you mentioned your 24 over seven, remote care.

We use Mantra Health.

So which vendors are going to be good partners for every individual student?

I think we take that approach very seriously.

We think AWS is I think we see our students not just as students, but really we provide them a human centered education which, recognizing that they're all human, they bring to the classroom the stress of whatever's happening at home, the stress of their sport, the stress of their job, all those things intermingled, intermingled for all of us here, our work lives.

That balance thing isn't really a balance anymore, right?

Everything connects and I think that happens in the classroom as well.

Darlene, you want to add to that?

No.

Not really.

I think what you said is sort of spot on.

We're very fortunate at Suny, we have, strong support from the Suny, the chancellor, and our directors of counseling centers get together monthly to collaborate and discuss things and come up with solutions.

We have a local area college counseling center group.

I think that is so important because we're not alone in this work and we're not alone in our support of students.

And it's just super helpful to have that.

Let me also briefly ask about we touched on it earlier, but I want to talk about academic pressure.

Over the past 50 years, the average grade in American colleges and universities has risen dramatically.

It's true at elite schools like Harvard, maybe you saw reporting, that Harvard's average grade point average climbed from 2.6 in 1950, 3.4 in 2003, and now the average GPA at Harvard is 3.8.

20 years ago, around a quarter of Harvard students got straight A's.

Today, 60% of students on Harvard's campus are getting straight A's.

And that's not true just for elite schools.

And and everybody on stage is elite.

But I think you know what we mean here.

It's not just the Ivy League.

So in 1990, the average GPA across U.S.

higher education institutions was 2.81.

In 2020, the average GPA was 3.15.

And a generation ago, the most common average grade for a college student in this country was a C in any given class.

Today, the most common average grade is a. And so I think of a couple things I think about for the students who are not getting straight A's are the students who are not getting 3.8 or 3.9.

Does that lead to more anxiety?

Does that lead to saying like, is there something wrong?

Because what used to be more common?

I mean, I mentioned before the program, my first semester at college, I got a 2.5, I got two B's and two C's.

My father was not thrilled with it and it lit a fire.

I don't think I worked hard enough in that first semester, but it also wasn't uncommon for my peers to have C's or D's, or really struggle or fight to pass a class and stay up all night.

Especially those, you know, taking non journalism classes or the journalism classes were rigorous too.

I just wonder what this means, what this portends.

And I want to get back his take first.

So, Doctor Morris, do you think with the rising average grade, does that put more academic pressure on students in general?

I think there's there's more pressure to succeed, for a variety of reasons.

The the cost of education, the value of it, seeing what your peers are earning in a class, I think that absolutely adds to the pressure.

I think some schools are doing other things to help mitigate some of that pressure.

Right.

So an awesome student can after they complete the course.

So not before but after.

If they didn't earn the grade that they thought that they they could achieve.

Or maybe something happened that semester that caused him to fall slightly behind.

They can choose to switch that grade to a credit no credit only about 3 to 4% of students use that option, but it is an option so that students don't have to feel weighted down by their GPA.

My very first semester as well, I that was my lowest GPA that first semester, and then again my senior spring for a different reason.

But in general, right.

Though the GPA shouldn't be this feeling of, of anxiety or, or frustration and that you only have four years, some people take six and a lot of ten years ago, 15 years ago, people stayed in school at the detriment of their mental health because they could lose health insurance.

Right.

And that is no longer the case.

But now that health insurance is age based.

So people need to take breaks sometimes.

And if I'm investing, a good amount of money into the value of my education, I want it to be the best that it can be, and taking a break might be necessary.

I think the question of how we grade Necess is a whole different conversation.

But as you probably know, the University of Michigan has been one of the high profile schools that, every time they change their grading policy, it's been a national story.

And the most recent one, about a month ago, was they're going to postpone a plan to have an option for most of their freshman students, opt out of letter grades, and only receive pass fail if they want.

They're going to postpone that.

They got pressure from from donors who said, well, that looks soft, or that students should have to have the grade that they earn.

What do you say to those critics, Becca?

I think that, you know, faculty are always having conversations about their grading and what they're seeing in the classroom.

It is it's adolescents and teenagers.

New York state is now no longer requiring regents.

Right.

And allowing more, portfolio options or options that allow a student to demonstrate their success differently.

I think that is it is good.

Every student, using the same benchmark can be difficult for every single student.

But I think it is based on whatever that community that specific school needs.

Darlene, what do you make of, the academic pressure?

And do you think that the rising grade point average actually makes it harder for students?

I would imagine, yes.

Right.

I mean, I, I too did not do well, my first semester of college, but I also remember being excited to get a C on my first exam because it was hard.

Yeah.

Right.

So it's almost perspective and it's also, I think we're dealing with students who not only have, you know, different learning styles.

I think there's other things that they're bringing in at maybe they're, challenged with not having access to food or transportation or basic needs or.

Yes, maybe there's something going on in their family, so they're distracted and they can't give it their all or their best.

And I don't think colleges are always equipped to do that right, to, to cater to each individual student.

So I would say, yeah, most likely.

And what do you make of the critics who say the reason this is happening is now colleges and universities.

The sticker prices have gone up and students are more looked at as clients or customers to please.

And so the grades go up to please the customer.

Well, I don't know if that's true or not.

I don't I don't know that that's the case in Brockport.

I do know we really try to support students and retain them so they're successful and know when it's okay to support a student to not stay.

Okay.

Becca.

Yeah, I think, you know, private institutions, the sticker price is is scary, but there's a lot of financial aid and scholarships that help reduce that.

So I don't think that is the reason that that, grade inflation may be the case.

I think, students are earning their grades there.

I think that there's higher pressure to be high achievers.

It's a competitive workforce.

Graduate school is competitive.

So I think, we have to think about all the factors that are leading to those grading policies.

Doctor Becca Morris is vice president for Campus Life and dean of students at Hobart William Smith Colleges.

Darlene Schmitt is director of the Counseling Center at Suny Brockport, and we're joined by Giulianna Volpe, who's a psychology major at Finger Lakes Community College.

We're live from the Little Theater.

We've got a live audience here.

We're going to open up to their questions, and we can encourage the audience.

If you've got questions, comments, let's get them.

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This is Connections.

I'm Evan Dawson.

As I look out of the audience, I see Assembly member Harry Bronson.

I think I saw Commissioner Santiago.

From our CSD, there's a number of community leaders who have been coming out to these live events, and certainly the whole community is invited out as we do this.

It's great to see so many folks.

There's some folks at the micron we have move fast here.

So, sir, tell us your name and fire away.

Go ahead.

All right.

My name is Tim.

I just wanted to share.

Julian, thank you for sharing your story.

28 years ago, I had a crisis, and when I was in college and I actually went to my advisor, I said, I'm having a lot of problems.

And he had no clue.

Yeah.

And he just sent me back to my dorm.

It didn't really say anything.

I called my parents.

They said, I'm like, I cannot be here for more than two days or I won't be here.

And they said, drop out, come home and don't worry about it.

So I dropped out, came home, and it was such a weight that had lifted.

Yeah, right.

So I think that that a lot of times folks are, you know, from my personal experience, you have this path that you're think you need to be on.

And when that opens up, you can you can realize, oh, there's so many different options in life now.

I have three boys, you know, 20 years, I have master's degree.

And, you know, I'm pretty happy with everything.

But now I'm looking at my three boys who are about to go into college, and it's like, how do we build up that resilience with them when they lead in to that, that period?

So what can I be doing now with my teenagers to help support them when they do go down that path?

Yeah.

Thank you for that comment.

You want to start there, Darlene?

Oh, sure.

Yeah.

I think exactly what your parents did.

You create the space that they know you love them unconditionally, that you don't.

Your love isn't measured by their academic achievements and that there's a lot of paths that they can go down and they'll find their own, letting them know about the resources.

Your advisor 28 years ago probably didn't know what to student at the time.

Hopefully that's changed today, but also just letting your students know when if they do choose to go to college.

If you get there and you're struggling, this is this is where you can go.

And when you do the tours, go and check out the counseling center and things like that.

And maybe Becca, when you do the tour, if you don't get good answers on that, that would be, yeah, stay away.

Yeah.

I think schools a lot now, especially as we are in the process when a student takes a leave of absence because you said, you know, I needed to go home.

We want to stay engaged with that student.

We offer, the personal empowerment quartz to say, how can we build these this resiliency, in case you choose to go back, one thing, my 17 year old is also on the college search, but is on the college search because I work in higher education.

So I do think the 16, 17 year olds are starting to think about what are my opportunities.

It might include college, it might not.

So for me, I've been just open as to here's what your options are here.

What what do you want your options to be?

And looking for an institution that will match specifically what their their needs are?

I think that is really important to go on a trip of 50 schools in your area might be overwhelming to a student these days saying, which of these five have the services that you need, the disability services, the academic accommodations that might work for you?

Knowing that in advance, I think is really helpful.

Giulianna, I know you've been having a good experience at FLQ.

If you were to go elsewhere, how important would it be to to understand that landscape before you even got there?

Pretty important.

Pretty important.

Yeah.

I so I'm planning on transferring to Geneseo.

Okay.

And so on the tours and stuff, I've.

I didn't I think I did ask, actually, it was a while ago, so it's kind of hard to remember, but, you know, in general definitely is important to ask, you know, what are the mental health services like?

Because I think, you know, the fact that students can get it for free, at least to that folk that I know of is really is such a great thing.

So I think just, you know, being able to ask that question and getting that answer would be very important.

I know it would definitely be important, you know, for me to know, because having therapy every other week can be very helpful just to talk about things.

Thank you very much, sir.

Next up at the mic.

Go ahead.

Hi.

My name is Becky Keefer.

I'm actually the director at the Health and Wellness Center at Saint John Fisher.

I don't have a question.

I have two comments.

And first and foremost, I want to thank the panel, and you have been for bringing this, conversation forward.

And you all very well highlighted the complexity of really the mental health as a, as a health issue.

And it's complex.

And so really, thank you all for doing that.

I also want to share that I know Darlene and Becca.

And we have I would like to highlight the fact that in our area, we have a wonderful collaborative relationship with many universities in discussing these issues, as Darlene and Becca have highlighted.

And that's a really unique thing that exists here in Western New York.

And I've certainly benefited as a director.

So I really just wanted to, thank them both.

And really highlight that in our area.

We do have a wonderful collaborative.

So thank you so much.

Thank you for coming out today.

Thank you very much for that comment.

Go ahead sir.

Good afternoon everybody.

My name is, Reverend Sam Kinsman.

I'm the Protestant chaplain at UVA and RIT.

And first, Giulianna, I'd like to commend you on your boldness and how you're speaking about your struggle with suicidality is so meaningful and can really help people.

And many of us have struggled with suicidality and have come through.

So keep up the good work.

My question is this, in addition to the mental health concerns we're seeing in Gen Z across our therapeutic colleagues, for those of us in chaplaincy who's work is accompanying students through the challenges of life, walking through with students, one of the major factors we're noticing in the field of interfaith chaplaincy is a growing nihilism, nothingness, this ennui, this what's the point?

And that's being felt as a burden on the shoulders of Gen Z. And it's either manifesting panic attacks, it's manifesting the desire to sleep for a long time.

It is a weight on their bodies, on their souls.

So my question is, are we aware of this creeping nihilism?

As caretakers in Western New York?

And what can we do about that to help Gen Z and beyond know that we will walk through these challenges with them.

I just want to put a pin in this and say, come on, Connections on a different day.

And we're going to talk about the way we build meaning, building meaning in life.

Sometimes this gets pigeonholed into, well, there's car thefts and 14 year olds are feeling nihilism.

Nihilism can be pervasive in a lot of places.

It's insidious.

It's really sneaky.

Okay.

You're invited.

You're going to come back here.

Thank you very much.

Now let's have the panel kind of walk through this here.

Darlene.

Yeah, that's a really heavy question.

I think in my therapy session.

Yeah.

What's it?

I'm going to talk about it in my therapist.

I know, I mean, I have, kids that are Gen Z, so I do hear, like, what's the point?

What's this future, this country, this world is such a and I mean, I think if you were to really do some looking back in history, I think almost every generation has had some similar level of crisis.

Although I'd probably be, argue that this is pretty bad.

I think it's not uncommon for generations to struggle and feel hopeless about the future.

What I try to do with my kids and students I work with is what gives them hope.

What?

What is it?

That where's your passion?

What can you do?

What change can you make in the bigger picture?

But what do you have control over versus what you don't?

Yeah, yeah.

I think the, I like that you said what what what's your passion?

And I think about my kid who can doom scroll, in front of the TV for a while with their phone and a TV at the same time, and thinking about what, what major might you want?

Or.

And I knew I wanted to be a teacher, although I changed my major 15 times.

She's kind of taking a step back and unsure which means that there's nothing in that conversation happening but leading with what do you like to do?

What classes are you taking right now that are your strengths?

Art?

She got exposed to criminal justice by accident in an elective, and now that's her one of her favorite classes.

How can we cultivate that and kind of say, here's this goal that you might have in the future?

Yeah.

Thank you.

Giulianna, do you want to weigh in on that as well here?

I mean, what do you make of it?

Yeah.

I mean, I know I've definitely asked myself that question a few times, actually.

And I think, you know, when you don't really know, like, what your purpose in life is, especially at a young age.

I mean, how can you know?

I feel like there's a lot of pressures to, you know, have a list of colleges you want to check out.

By the time you're 17, you know, by 16 you should have your license and you should be driving and you should be, you know, having a job and stuff.

And, like, those things are important to kind of start planning things out.

But I do feel like it can add pressure.

So I would say, you know, something to remember is some people don't find it, some people just create it.

And if anyone has seen the movie Joe Dirt, he says, you know, life's a garden ticket.

Make it work for you.

And I think that's very prevalent.

I actually wrote about that in a discussion post for one of my classes yesterday.

So I think just to remember that for what, no matter what generation you are, just to remember that that like, you know, certain things you want to do in your life mean you may not be able to, for whatever reason, you know that you don't have access to it, but you find something else and you just you make it work for you and you find things to live for.

So yeah, I love that.

Thank you.

Thank you very much.

Okay.

We got to move fast here.

Go ahead.

Okay.

Hello.

My name is John Rigney.

I'm from Nazareth University.

I'm the assistant director of outreach.

Thank you to the panelists.

Hi, Darlene.

Hi, Becca.

Joanna, thank you so much for your honesty and just your vulnerability and everything that you said.

It was amazing.

It reminds me of why we are doing what we're doing.

And I agree with Becky, and we have a great resource from the Rochester community.

And we've been getting creative.

And so one of the creative things that we've done lately is we applied for the SAMHSa, Suicide Administration, Mental Health Service, Grant.

And so it's it supports mental health and suicide prevention.

So I just wanted to give a shout out for that and say thank you to everyone for being here.

Thank you for coming.

And thanks for sharing that and the work you're doing on campus.

Thank you very, very much.

Thank you.

All right.

We got time for one more here.

High Commissioner Fineman from the Rochester City School District.

I just have a question from the high school level.

Is there anything you feel that the high school level could help support you on your college journey?

Is this for Giulianna?

It's for Giulianna.

Okay.

I'm sorry I asked the question one more time.

Do you think there's anything that we could do on a high school level to help prepare you for your college journey?

I think something like what you had said were you guys have, like, a class or some sort of.

Yeah, I think maybe implementing something like that or even having some sort of club or different events throughout the year for, for anyone in high school to, to go to, to basically learn resilience skills and to, you know, remind them that they don't have to go to college.

And if they do, they don't have to rush to make a decision, you know, like, there shouldn't be a rush to anything just because of, you know, their age or anything like that.

So just to to be there to support them, you know, different things to remind them that life's a garden, make it work for you.

Love that.

Is that.

Commissioner.

Thanks for being here, Commissioner.

Let me also just say that, you said you don't have to go to college.

We mentioned at the start the Healthy Mind study, 84,000 college students, 69% of college students are self-reporting a mental or behavioral health concern in the past year for their same age peers who are not in college.

It's in the low 50s.

So getting into college, going to college doesn't just free you up to automatically think what the future is going to be better.

For me, everything's great.

It actually, in many ways is adding pressure and adding challenge on the mental health side.

And that's why we've had this conversation today.

This is a chance for me to thank everyone, not only for coming out today, spending your afternoon with us, with outstanding feedback from the audience that really a lot of these conversations are going to grow into other hours on the show.

So thank you for that.

And really, let's thank the panel here.

Doctor Becca Morris is, vice president for Campus Life and dean of students at Hobart and William Smith College's Darlene Schmitt, director of the counseling center at Suny Brockport.

And Giulianna Volpe, a standing ovation for you, psychology major.

Everyone, this this is one of your future therapists.

This is one of your future therapists from the whole team of Connections.

And I cannot name everybody.

But we have such a wonderful team here, starting with the production staff and all the way to the truck.

So if you see them on your way out of here.

Thank you.

Because thank them because they're making so many amazing things happen.

And if this is your first trip out to the little in a while, come on back here.

We got so many wonderful things happening.

I'm Evan Dawson, thanks for listening.

Thanks for finding us wherever you find us.

And we're back with you tomorrow on member supported public media.

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