Many college and university counseling centers have embraced a social justice framework within their service delivery models and policies. A resurgence of this focus has been seen since the pandemic that originated in 2020. Despite this commitment to social justice work, many university and counseling centers vary in their inclusion of social justice practices due to a lack of an universal model to provide guidance to centers. Without such a framework, ethical and professional issues are bound to occur and can have detrimental consequences for university and college counseling center staff, university and college students, as well as the college and university community and greater society. Any viable framework will include other systemic needs in order to sustain a socially just service delivery model.

College and University campuses have long been the site of major advocacy efforts, not only on campuses but geared towards local, state and federal change. As professionals, therapists in college counseling centers may feel that they can, at best, work to support individual students involved in these efforts. Noble as this is, how might college counseling professionals work to support these efforts? In this presentation, participants will learn about advocacy as action and discuss examples of how college counseling professionals can engage in advocacy efforts; they then will brainstorm potential advocacy efforts to engage with on their campuses and discuss ideas for effectively beginning and/or joining these efforts.

Though the field of mental health has made great strides and movements towards the development of multicultural competencies and culturally responsive treatments for subjugated identities, these are still rooted in the notion of expertise and emphasizing the use of labels that inadequately define and describe diverse identities.  In response to this, presenters will offer strategies that address the absence of follow-through in many commitments and intentions to be Diversity-Equity-Inclusion in service delivery of mental health services.  Through the integration of Sociocultural Systems Theory and the Multidimensional Ecosystemic Comparative Approach presenters will highlight guidelines for practice that emphasize the development of intercultural skills that integrate experiences of migration when engaging with students born outside the mainland U.S.

This presentation will focus on the development and expansion of the Nurturing Minority Wellness program (NMW). NMW is a program developed by Student Health and Wellbeing at University of Missouri-Columbia to support the mental health and wellness needs of marginalized students, particularly students of color, at the University of Missouri-Columbia. Through a collaboration with the Counseling Center and Wellness Resource Center, NMW centers a holistic view of the mental health and wellness of students of color at a predominantly White institution. In this presentation, participants will learn about the development of the program and how to prioritize student perspectives in advocacy work at a university setting. Key topics will include developing trust amongst staff and students, developing student focused initiatives, and implementing culturally informed services. Participants will also be able to ask questions and brainstorm advocacy initiatives at their own institution with the founder of the NMW program, the current NMW program coordinator, and two student consultants.

Campus counseling centers across the country are seeing persistent increased demands for services and there is also a known gap in utilization rates for students of color. Students of color face challenges including discrimination, imposterism, stigma, cultural mistrust, and feelings of isolation. Addressing the mental health concerns of students of color requires a campus-wide approach. This session will review The Jed Foundation’s Comprehensive Approach and The Equity in Mental Health Framework. The Equity in Mental Health Framework focuses on specific recommendations to support structural changes in policy, and engage senior leadership to reduce stigma and provide additional opportunities for students of color to thrive.

This experiential workshop will focus on building a culturally diverse and inclusive college counseling center that’s centered on cultural humility and equitable practices. Facilitators will guide participants on creating a diversity plan for their center that includes establishing annual goals and implementing recruitment and retention strategies for diverse staff members and trainees. Moreover, Facilitators will discuss ways to develop a multicultural care team that provides administrative, clinical, and outreach consultation to the center and campus community. Additionally, this workshop will focus on responding to racial/bias incidents on campus and establishing brave spaces to engage in dialogue. Lastly, this workshop will explore assessing cultural humility and offering a multicultural counseling specialization for trainees.

This presentation explores the role of student advocacy on a college campus, using mental health advocacy as an example. Participants will learn the arguments for and against advocacy within mental health and explore the link between advocacy and mental health as a field. This presentation will explain preventative factors and barriers to student advocacy. It will focus primarily on burnout as a barrier to advocacy. Participants will learn about the structural factors on college campuses which contribute to burnout, particularly of students with already marginalized identities. Understanding the system of college campuses allows participants to greater understand the nuances which factor into the development of burnout amongst student advocates. This presentation will explore an outreach event aimed at supporting students who engage in advocacy and how participants can design a similar event aimed at their campuses.

Despite efforts to address concerns with equity, diversity, and inclusion at academic institutions, university students who identify as Black at PWIs continue to report the harmful effects of racism, other identity-based oppression, and being both hyper-visible and invisible on campus (Kelly et al., 2021). Located within a private PWI in the deep south, the Vanderbilt University Counseling Center (UCC) has sought to mitigate this harm by implementing community healing outreach efforts that support belongingness and connectedness for Black-identified students. Community-based healing practices, such as storytelling, have been an integral source of coping and wellbeing within Black communities for generations and encourage participants to voice the harm caused by historical and structural trauma and facilitate restorative wellness (Henerdson, Stephens, Ortega-Williams, and Walton, 2021). This presentation will provide attendees with a model for a community-based healing approach.

This presentation is intended to provide an overview of the newest edition of the World Professional Association for Transgender Health’s (WPATH) Standards of Care for the Health of Transgender and Gender Diverse People, Version 8 (SOC 8). The presenters will cover sections of the SOC 8 relevant to college counseling. The presenters will also offer practical advice for treating transgender and gender diverse college students based on best practices, peer reviewed literature, and personal experience. The presenters will make recommendations that can be implemented in a college counseling setting.

Parallel to BIPOC students on campuses, BIPOC staff in university counseling centers (UCCs) are often faced with unique barriers that cause them to doubt their capabilities and or minimize their contributions in historically and/or predominantly white spaces. This presentation aims to help UCC staff and managers reflect on their current practices and identifies strategies to help create a more inclusive and equitable environment for BIPOC staff to thrive and own their power. This presentation hopes to raise awareness by highlighting relational and systemic factors that contribute to the recruitment and retention of BIPOC staff in UCCs. It also provides suggestions for UCC and campus leaders on how to advocate in the larger effort of shifting agency culture towards greater inclusivity and empowerment of BIPOC staff development and retention.

University and college counseling centers are serving increasingly diverse student bodies. Although diversity has increased among college campuses, it is often not reflected among our university staff in counseling centers. Furthermore, professional psychology and counseling organizations have more recently emphasized the importance of increasing diversity among faculty and staff in higher education. To create a respectful and welcoming environment that will attract and retain staff from diverse backgrounds, we must develop systematic, coherent, and long-term efforts within our centers to achieve this aim. In this session, we will explore challenges faced by university and college counseling centers in recruitment and retention efforts, identify strategies to recruit and retain diverse staff using the employee lifecyle model, and discuss evaluation of these efforts.