[Wsssc] {Disarmed} FW: Today’s students and mental health

Thu Jun 10 09:58:44 PDT 2021

Colleagues: see below, FYI. Also on the topic of student mental health, we are developing the application process for mental health counseling and services grants, funded by Senate Bill 5194 this Legislative Session. We received a $1M appropriation for the biennium ($500K per year of the biennium) to award to pilot programs selected through a competitive process. Watch for an announcement in the next few weeks. We are hoping for a July 15 launch of the application, through OGMS. Attached is the enacted legislation, FYI. See Section 6 for an outline of the pilot program.

Joe

[Compass]
Joe Holliday
Director, Student Services
Washington State Board for Community and Technical Colleges
jholliday at sbctc.edu<mailto:jholliday at sbctc.edu>• o: 360-704-4334 • f: 360-704-4418
sbctc.edu<https://www.sbctc.edu/> • Twitter: @SBCTCWashington<https://twitter.com/SBCTCWashington> • Facebook: @WASBCTC<https://www.facebook.com/wasbctc/>

SBCTC Vision:

“Leading with racial equity, our colleges maximize student potential and transform lives within a culture of belonging that advances racial, social, and economic justice in service to our diverse communities.”

From: Jan Yoshiwara <jyoshiwara at sbctc.edu>
Sent: Monday, June 7, 2021 9:04 AM
To: Joe Holliday <jholliday at sbctc.edu>
Subject: FW: Today’s students and mental health

fyi

Jan Yoshiwara
Executive Director
Washington State Board for Community and Technical Colleges

From: Julie Peller <info at higherlearningadvocates.org<mailto:info at higherlearningadvocates.org>>
Sent: Monday, June 7, 2021 7:23 AM
To: Jan Yoshiwara <jyoshiwara at sbctc.edu<mailto:jyoshiwara at sbctc.edu>>
Subject: Today’s students and mental health

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June 2021 News & Updates
Dear Friend,

On top of the pandemic, over a year of online and hybrid classes, lost jobs, and other stressors, today’s students have been faced with an additional challenge this year: mental health. College students struggled with mental health challenges long before the pandemic began—29 percent<https://higherlearningadvocates.us12.list-manage.com/track/click?u=ca746de3b563bcb8e8c18305b&id=324f07f753&e=9f95394474> of young adults (ages 18 to 25) have a diagnosable mental illness, not to mention the many older adult students who are not captured by this statistic. But the COVID-19 pandemic only made matters worse. Seventy-five percent<https://higherlearningadvocates.us12.list-manage.com/track/click?u=ca746de3b563bcb8e8c18305b&id=f7561a77f1&e=9f95394474> of students reported worse mental health since the pandemic began and 60 percent<https://higherlearningadvocates.us12.list-manage.com/track/click?u=ca746de3b563bcb8e8c18305b&id=599cc57b35&e=9f95394474> reported that accessing mental health care was difficult due to campus closures.

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For Mental Health Awareness Month this May, Higher Learning Advocates focused our efforts on raising awareness of the mental health challenges that today’s students face and advocating for policies that would help them access the resources they need.

Check out our resources below and help us continue to advocate for today’s students’ mental health needs!

College students are facing a mental health crisis — let’s talk about how we can help.
HLA's Senior Manager for Policy and Strategic Initiatives Nikhil Vashee wrote<https://higherlearningadvocates.us12.list-manage.com/track/click?u=ca746de3b563bcb8e8c18305b&id=622707b3fa&e=9f95394474> about how federal policy can help support today’s students’ mental health:

  1.  Congress should increase appropriations to the Garrett Lee Smith federal grant program to reflect the increasing demand for mental health services on campus, and
  2.  ED should study and provide guidance on campus mental health policies.

We are thankful that the Department of Education, in their updated Higher Education Emergency Relief Fund (HEERF) guidance<https://higherlearningadvocates.us12.list-manage.com/track/click?u=ca746de3b563bcb8e8c18305b&id=22f80b243d&e=9f95394474> issued on May 11, clarified that HEERF funding can be used for additional mental health support systems for college students. Support for students is essential, especially as the pandemic continues.

To learn more about how mental health challenges impact today’s students, check out our Mental Health Fact Sheet<https://higherlearningadvocates.us12.list-manage.com/track/click?u=ca746de3b563bcb8e8c18305b&id=5359ac11b9&e=9f95394474>. You can also use this quick and easy-to-use form<https://higherlearningadvocates.us12.list-manage.com/track/click?u=ca746de3b563bcb8e8c18305b&id=33613090b4&e=9f95394474> to ask your members of Congress to act now to support today’s students' mental health.

Read more mental health resources here.<https://higherlearningadvocates.us12.list-manage.com/track/click?u=ca746de3b563bcb8e8c18305b&id=53db88e502&e=9f95394474>

Improving Free Community College Proposals to Better Help Today’s Students
On the Higher Learning Advocates Medium<https://higherlearningadvocates.us12.list-manage.com/track/click?u=ca746de3b563bcb8e8c18305b&id=ab0c75c306&e=9f95394474>, Executive Director Julie Peller wrote about the benefits of the America’s College Promise Act, which seeks to ensure that college cost is not a barrier for today’s students, as well as how it could be improved.

While this legislation addresses some student needs, such as transfer of credit, connections to benefits, and student success, the legislation could be improved by adding income considerations, Satisfactory Academic Progress requirements, and a sharper focus on outcomes.

Read more from Julie here<https://higherlearningadvocates.us12.list-manage.com/track/click?u=ca746de3b563bcb8e8c18305b&id=d03735fcdb&e=9f95394474>.

America’s public flagship universities lack diversity. These policy recommendations can help fix it.
HLA’s Senior Manager for Policy and Strategic Initiatives Nikhil Vashee wrote about the lack of diversity at public flagship universities and how systemic barriers harm Black, Latinx, and low-income students.

“The system itself is broken. Many selective public institutions work under a series of incentives that push them to enroll higher income students. The results of state funding formulas and cuts to public education incentivize universities to recruit from wealthier areas or to focus on those who can afford to pay out-of-state tuition. Institutions may also allocate the available resources they have for scholarships to attract students of wealthier backgrounds and use admissions criteria such as legacy admissions, which do not consider merit but instead give students of affluent backgrounds whose family members attended the school a leg up. In order for higher education to become more equitable for low-income, Black, and Latinx students, things have to change, both at institutions themselves and within public policy.”

Read more from Nikhil here<https://higherlearningadvocates.us12.list-manage.com/track/click?u=ca746de3b563bcb8e8c18305b&id=bc1ce84fdd&e=9f95394474>.

Pell students can now access the Emergency Broadband Benefits
As of May 12, the Emergency Broadband Benefit became available to all Pell recipients! Students can now access the benefit by signing up at GetEmergencyBroadband.org<https://higherlearningadvocates.us12.list-manage.com/track/click?u=ca746de3b563bcb8e8c18305b&id=eaf2af143a&e=9f95394474> to receive a $50 per month subsidy to help pay for internet at home, and up to $100 for a connected device. Read more about the EBB here<https://higherlearningadvocates.us12.list-manage.com/track/click?u=ca746de3b563bcb8e8c18305b&id=3ea926ab41&e=9f95394474>.

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Read more about the EBB here.<https://higherlearningadvocates.us12.list-manage.com/track/click?u=ca746de3b563bcb8e8c18305b&id=3c0ec3d9a9&e=9f95394474>

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The Two-Faced Promise of Higher Education
Anthony Carnevale and Jeff Strohl of Georgetown University’s Center for Education and the Workforce<https://higherlearningadvocates.us12.list-manage.com/track/click?u=ca746de3b563bcb8e8c18305b&id=59771f2266&e=9f95394474> wrote in Insights & Outlooks about how the higher education system in America helps to increase racial segregation.
"The four-year college degree has long been the gold standard and the surest gateway to economic opportunity in the United States. But while the four-year degree provides access to the entry-level work and graduate education that lead, in turn, to the best-paying jobs, it starkly divides Americans by race. Often lauded as the great equalizer, education is instead a modern segregationist. It pretends to connect individual merit with individual opportunity while instead preserving or compounding long standing racial advantages and disadvantages. Rather than dismantling our country’s shameful history of racial stratification, it extends and intensifies our racial divides.”

Read more here<https://higherlearningadvocates.us12.list-manage.com/track/click?u=ca746de3b563bcb8e8c18305b&id=c357739190&e=9f95394474>.

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Campus Mental Health Awareness Leads Policy Efforts at the Federal and State Level
Jill Dunlap, Senior Director of Research, Policy, and Civic Engagement at NASPA, wrote for Insights and Outlooks about the mental health crisis on college campuses and how federal and state policy change could help.
"The mental health crisis on college campuses, prior to 2020, often referred to the overwhelming demand on campus mental health centers and their frequent inability to meet that demand. Waiting lists and inadequate staffing levels to support student mental health needs were often at the center of the discussion. Along came the COVID-19 pandemic, which resulted in many students losing access to free, accessible mental health services provided at their institutions. Scores of news articles described the new mental health crisis—students without access to mental health supports were facing a new online campus environment while many students faced the stresses of living at home and navigating the health and economic challenges presented during the past year.”

Read more here.<https://higherlearningadvocates.us12.list-manage.com/track/click?u=ca746de3b563bcb8e8c18305b&id=8639884f78&e=9f95394474>

Welcome to HLA’s New Senior Advocacy Director
Tanya Ang!
Higher Learning Advocates is thrilled to welcome Tanya Ang to the team as Senior Advocacy Director. Tanya joined HLA excited to continue the work she had been doing advocating on behalf of today’s learners. She comes with over 20 years of higher education experience with much of that experience focused on identifying and promoting policies that best support ways to increase access and attainment of higher learning for all students. She believes higher education can be as life changing for others as it was for her and her siblings, all first-generation students.
Read more about Tanya on our website<https://higherlearningadvocates.us12.list-manage.com/track/click?u=ca746de3b563bcb8e8c18305b&id=ef69b165b3&e=9f95394474> and follow her on Twitter<https://higherlearningadvocates.us12.list-manage.com/track/click?u=ca746de3b563bcb8e8c18305b&id=f43862d218&e=9f95394474>.
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