Located on the second floor of the student health building, the center is a place where students can find help for any emotional or psychological distress they are experiencing at no cost to them.
“One of the best things about having the counseling center here is that it’s free,” says student employee, Anna Zyazko. “As long as you’re a student you can use the service.”
From homesickness and academic stress to bi-polar disorder and severe depression, the center deals with all manner of psychological and emotional conditions. “We do get students who have heavy issues,” says CAPS associate director Jennifer Sanford. “Many of them come to HSU with pre-existing diagnoses and traumas and it’s our job to see that the ones who come to us get the help they need.”
To receive services students simply go to the front desk and fill out a form. The first appointment is a 50-minute consultation in which the counselor gets a feel for what the student is going through and figures out the best course of action. On-going one-on-one counseling appointments are then scheduled if the crisis is something that can be managed with regular appointments.
For students who are unable to wait for an appointment, the center provides a drop-in service, which is a shorter 30-minute appointment. The drop-in service is available Monday through Wednesday after 1 p.m. The center even provides an on-call therapist for students who feel they may be in crisis.
“Just knowing someone is there in case you’re having an emergency,” says Zyazko. “I think that’s crucial.”
Students who don’t need one-on-one counseling can join group sessions for specific issues such as grief, healthy attachments, LGBT, personal growth and attachments, and even a meditation group. Some of the sessions do require a session with a counselor to determine if group sessions will benefit the student.
“A lot of times, it just helps for students to talk to someone else who has experienced a similar situation,” says Sanford. “The groups help them to get out their emotions and talk openly about things that are bothering them.”
Students who may be in need of more help than what the counseling center can provide during short-term, on-going care are referred to a professional in the community who is able to maintain a counseling relationship with such a client, opening up the schedule for other students.
Although the counseling center is unable to provide medication prescriptions for students, it is able to refer students to the student health center, which has physicians who can prescribe such medications as anti-depressants or anti-anxiety medications for those who need them.
“Sometimes students come to HSU who are already taking medication,” says Sanford. “Some of those students decide to stop taking it and are then in need of our services. They come to us and we’ll refer them to student health center where they can get their meds.”
The center employs three full-time licensed clinicians, three post-graduate trainees, one practicum student and an administrator, who is also acts as a counselor. The counselors each have their own special field, such as body image issues or drug and alcohol addiction, but they are also well educated in the general psychology that they are able to aid anyone who comes in.