Giving Compass' Take:

• The California Community College system partnered with Crisis Text Line in 2017 as a way for students who are experiencing mental health issues to have access to free help and advice.  A year later, colleges are gaining valuable insight into the struggles students face.

• With the insight from the Crisis Text Line, colleges can now tailor more mental health programs that fit student needs. However, how can schools that have less access and funding for high-quality training/counselors address these barriers? 

• Read about how students are changing the conversation about mental health issues. 

Several community college campuses in California lack mental health services. But students today are increasingly seeking access to counseling to cope with depression, anxiety and other challenges.

Now the country’s largest community college system is turning to technology to connect more students with mental-health services—and to better understand what challenges students are grappling with most.

The California Community College system, which is made up of 114 institutions, partnered with the Crisis Text Line in May 2017 to offer students a free and anonymous way to get help during mental health emergencies. As of June, nearly 2,800 students have engaged in 4,500 conversations through the texting service, according to Colleen Ganley, a mental health specialist at the California Community Colleges Chancellor’s Office.

The text line has already illuminated alarming trends. According to Ganley, anxiety and stress are the top issues facing students who use the service, representing 43 percent of instances.

The partnership with the Crisis Text Line—which is free for the college system as well as for students—has been one answer to rising demand for mental-health interventions at colleges.

Meanwhile, on-campus counseling services have also been slow to catch up with increasing demand in California, where 95 of the 114 community college campuses have physical student mental health service centers.

And addressing stress and anxiety is crucial to increasing student success and completion at community colleges, which often serve large populations of students who are low-income or are the first in their families to go to college, says Ganley. “If a student is not well—physically or mentally—their likelihood of graduating and staying the course and doing that in as timely a manner as possible is reduced.”

Read the full article about students' mental health by Sydney Johnson at EdSurge