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Mental health experts Tara Harper and Seli Fakorzi join Inside Higher Ed’s editor in chief, Sara Custer, in a new episode of The Key, IHE’s news and analysis podcast, to talk about how colleges are supporting students and staff as they grapple with economic uncertainty and political division.
With symptoms of anxiety and depression already on the rise among college students, Harper, assistant vice president for student well-being and clinical operations at Lincoln University, said there have been “some scary moments” in the past few months. “We’ve told our international students to stay here, stay on campus, just so we can avoid them not being able to return in the fall.”
About 90 percent of students at Lincoln are Pell Grant eligible, Harper said. “So that’s a fear—like, are they going to be able to afford college?” Congress is currently considering legislation that would change the minimum requirement for credit hours to receive the maximum amount of the grant.
Meanwhile, changes to student loan repayment plans have affected faculty and staff, she added. “Faculty and staff with student loan payments are worrying about salaries—are they going to make enough to cover these payments because of the changes to the student loan repayment plans?”
Fakorzi, director of mental health operations at TimelyCare, shared advice on how to help students find support systems as well as build skills around mindfulness and resilience. “Those are empowering for students,” she said. “We’re then transferring this to a strengths-based approach to empower them to do as much as they can to stay educated and stay aware.”
