Mental Health Problems College Students Facing Today

What are mental health challenges on college campuses today, and how are colleges responding? To discuss the problems college students face, this essay will first analyze the mental health challenges on college campuses, and then focus on the way colleges respond to it. 

Coming into college, people believe that now that you made it into college, you will have an easier road. That’s not the case. College students, especially in the United States face many significant mental health problems which include depression and anxiety. I have a friend who has suffered from depression, which not only affected their health but affected their daily life routine. They lost motivation for going to class or doing work. It was impossible to leave the dorm because he consistently had depressed thoughts most of the time. As he gave it more time to heal, he talked to friends about it, got more hobbies, and put his happiness first. Sadly, this is not the case for most students, these mental health challenges have been getting worse over the years, and since old friends and family aren’t around, students will not be able to find help. If the health issues are left untreated, then over time it will get worse. Not only will the symptoms affect your health but it will make it hard to cope with the daily routine of life. It leads to the students to become isolated from the world, struggling in school, or worse, attempting suicide or doing drugs. For that reason, colleges have been struggling to aid the students with support like more counselors and better mental health education.

Mental health problems have been increasing over the years. But for decades, the problem has been swept under the rug. Fifty years ago, students would see college to be impossible if they had mental health problems. Today, more students are attending colleges and with them come mental health problems. Mental Health problems can have a big emotional toll on a person that can have a stigma. It makes reaching out for support the hardest step on the path towards recovery. Students fear to reach out because they often feel embarrassed or ashamed to reach out for help. In 2017, a study shows that 81 percent of students who made suicide attempts had no known or undiagnosed mental health issues but for the ones who did have a mental health issue, the leading diagnoses were depression and anxiety. Some students won’t be affected by this and will thrive under these conditions, others, on the other hand, will struggle. The report from the “Healthy Minds Study” shows that only 4 in 10 students have positive mental health and will flourish as a student. But in the last decade, mental health problems like depression and anxiety have doubled. In 2017, about 34% of students were being diagnosed with mental health problems, compared to only 19% of students in 2007. Now in the present, our millennial and gen-z students are being mostly affected by mental health issues. Our generation is full of problems, which is why mental health can sometimes still go unnoticed. Campuses need to identify who it is who suffers from mental health and give out Aid.

One of the most common challenges students face in college would be depression. It’s such a big problem that depression has increased to over 20 percent from the last ten years. Depression also leads to other consequences, such as suicide or drugs. The rise in suicides of college-age has left many campuses across the country in shock and are struggling because death by suicide was the second leading cause of death between the ages of 15-24. An investigation by the New England Center for Investigative Reporting shows that from 2007 to 2016, around 18 students from the University of Massachusetts Amherst, and 8 students each at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Harvard University committed suicides. Another example would be the suicide of Alexander Urtula who was a student for Boston College. Alex jumped off a roof of a parking garage hours before he was receiving his diploma. These examples show that depression can have such fatal results but for most students, depression leads them to substance abuse also. Mostly abuse of alcohol and drugs, especially on campus has become a significant issue. Substance abuse can impact a student's health mentally and physically, making it harder to perform well, build relationships, and work in school.

Another common Issue college students face today would be anxiety. We as human beings experience anxiety because of overwhelming stress. However, too much anxiety can be bad for us and stops us from functioning in our daily lives. 40 million U.S adults suffer from an anxiety disorder and by the time they are 22, they would have suffered from their first episode of extreme anxiety. College students can easily feel anxious trying to balance work, school, family & friends, and social life while also trying to figure out their future lives. Imagine trying to keep your grades up while working, barely getting 8 hours of sleep during finals week, As if it’s not already hard enough.

Both depression and anxiety will impact students similarly or different. An example would be my friend, who I mentioned in the intro. He was depressed but not to the point where he had suicidal thoughts. He didn’t want to do anything other than stay in my bed. He told me how he cried for a straight month. Since he was controlled by his depression, he ignored his daily life routine and school work. As time did it’s healing he started opening up to friends and getting help, after, anxiety came in. Since his depression didn’t make him do anything for school, he became anxious because there was so much work that he had to do for class. Fortunately, he took advantage of the anxiety so it can drive him to do better and study harder.

Since it has become a big national conversation now, campuses are trying their hardest to build more services. Campuses want to expand mental health services with more improved environments that are welcoming to students who suffer from mental issues. So much, that colleges are trying to take a step ahead of the problem by implementing more programs to help with mental health issues. There are schools like UCLA who have made notable approaches to create such proactive treatment by implementing a program called Screening and Treatment for Anxiety and Depression (STAND). In this program, students with mental issues like depression and anxiety are offered screening, tracking, and treatment. Even though colleges like UCLA are implementing these support programs, other schools struggle to meet the demand of more counselors as the problem grows. In 2018, the average wage for a school and career counselor was $56,000, Only 10 percent earned more than 90k and 10 percent earned lower than 40k. If the schools need more counselors, they would see that they aren't getting paid enough especially with the big demand there is now. We need to make the wages for college counselors a priority, as they have one of the most important jobs.

In conclusion, colleges have made mental health a top priority on campuses but still struggle to meet the demands. But this problem is not something that is only controlled by the school. We blame the schools so much but we need to realize that sometimes it is out of their hands. Sometimes schools aren't getting funded enough by either the state or federal government. Also, even though it's the counselors' job to help students, they aren't fully responsible for the issues the students face. We as students have the resources available in front of us. In this day of age, technology has become a big part of our life, so why not use it to help us cope with these issues. There are thousands of websites, videos, and articles all online for us to use. Also, some teachers are willing to help by advising you or giving you resources. It goes to show that we don't need to fully rely on counselors to get over our problems but we do need them. The fact is that there are so many more problems college students face and our society needs to come together to find a solution for them.

References

• BLS. “School and Career Counselors : Occupational Outlook Handbook.” U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, 4 Sept. 2019, www.bls.gov/ooh/community-and-social-service/school-and-career-counselors.htm#tab-5.
• Fernandes, Deirdre. “Colleges Struggle to Help Growing Number of Students with Mental Health Trouble - The Boston Globe.” BostonGlobe.com, The Boston Globe, 30 Oct. 2019, www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2019/10/29/colleges-struggle-help-growing-number-students-with-mental-health-trouble/WWmIPCn2bgsIWuxDHxsJ6H/story.html.
• Suzanne Ortega and Mitchell, Ted. “Inside Higher Ed.” Students' Mental Health Shouldn't Be the Responsibility of Campus Counseling Centers Alone (Opinion), 2019,,www.insidehighered.com/views/2019/10/29/students-mental-health-shouldnt-be-responsibility-campus-counseling-centers-alone.
• United Educators.“Mental Health Issues on Campus: Growing, Dangerous, and Costly.” Student Mental Health on Campus, 2017, www.ue.org/Student-Mental-Health/#overview.
• Mind, One. “Addressing Mental Health Challenges on College Campuses.” Forbes, Forbes Magazine, 4 Oct. 2019, www.forbes.com/sites/onemind/2019/10/04/addressing-mental-health-challenges-on-college-campuses/#2567b2ad400d.
• “Teens and College Students.” Anxiety and Depression Association of America, ADAA, 2019, adaa.org/living-with-anxiety/college-students.