Raechele Pope:
Welcome to Student Affairs Now, the online learning community for student affairs educators. I’m your host Raechele Pope. Today we’re discussing innovative campus approaches to college student mental health and wellness with Dr. Inge Hansen and Dr. Drea Letamendi.

Raechele Pope:
Student Affairs NOW is the premier podcast and learning community for thousands of us who work in, alongside, or adjacent to the field of higher education and student affairs. We hope you’ll find these conversations make a contribution to the field and are restorative to the profession. We release new episodes every week on Wednesdays. Find us at studentaffairsnow.com, on Youtube, or anywhere you listen to podcasts. Now today’s episode is sponsored by: LeaderShape. Go to LeadersShape.org to learn how they can work with you to create a just, caring, and thriving world. This episode is also sponsored by Everfi – the trusted partner for 1,500 colleges and universities. Everfi is the standard of care for student safety and well-being, with the results to prove it.

Raechele Pope:
Now, as I mentioned, I’m your host, Raechele Pope. My pronouns are she her and hers and I’m broadcasting from Williamsville New York near the campus of the University of Buffalo, where I serve as the Senior Associate Dean of Faculty and Student Affairs and the unit diversity officer for the graduate school of education. I’m also an associate professor in the higher education and student affairs programs. UB is situated on the unseated ancestral Homeland of the Haudenosaunee people. Drea and Inge, I am thrilled that you’re here. Thank you for joining me today for this episode of student affairs live and welcome to the podcast. And I’d like you to begin by telling us a little bit about you, your current role on campus. A bit about your pathway through student affairs, if that’s where you see yourself and the counseling and into the work that you do today. UI was wondering if,uDrea, if you could begin for us,

Drea Letamendi:
Absolutely. It is such a pleasure to be a part of this conversation. My name is Dr. Drea Letamendi. I am a licensed clinical psychologist professor and mental health consultant. I received my undergraduate degree from Cornell university, just upstate upstate New York. And then my PhD from UCSD. I currently serve UCLA. I actually have dual roles in student affairs, I’m an associate director of mental health training intervention and response in residential life and the interim director of our student resilience center, which is known as RISE. I’d say that you know, it’s important to mention that one of the ways that I kind of navigated my journey as, as an undergraduate and graduate student was through some of the topics that we’re going to talk about today. I delivered a TEDx talk called Capes Cows and Courage, which kind of details my experience with imposter syndrome and, and finding my way. And I also am a consultant for organizations, media companies, and the entertainment industry around how to represent mental health and really positive ways. Finally, my pronouns are she her and Ella, and I want to acknowledge that UCLA sits on the unseated land of Tovaangar, which is the land of the Gabrielino and Tongva peoples. Thank you for having me.

Raechele Pope:
Oh, grateful for you to be here. Thank you. Thank you. Inge.

Inge Hansen:
Thank you. Yes. Wonderful to be here and to, I’m just looking forward to a really juicy conversation with both of you. So my name is Dr. Inge Hansen. I use she, her pronouns also a licensed clinical psychologist here at Stanford University, which is on the unceded lands of the Muwekma Ohlone tribes. And my pathway getting here I was hired originally as a staff psychologist. I think back in the times that we were thinking a little bit about, we’re going to have an LGBTQ specialist psychologist and have evolved into a current role, which is the co-founder and director of the Weiland Health Initiative, which I look forward to talking about, and also the director of wellbeing at Stanford, and a little bit of that history just really arose from a desire to center the needs of trans non-binary students who weren’t being adequately served before. And I just have a real passion around the intersection between mental health and wellbeing and equity, inclusion, and justice. And looking at how we can talk more about synchronicity between the two.

Raechele Pope:
Well, we can almost do a whole show on just talking about your origin story than where you folks came from and how you came to this. Cause I find it fascinating. So I’m going to have to really reel myself in to make sure that I don’t just keep asking you questions there. So I’m going to immediately switch us to to talking about this topic. We’ve been doing mental health on campus forever. And like you both said that there are some new directions that we had to head in to make sure that we’re serving students who deserve to be served to the fullest of our ability. So what I wanted to ask you was why is it important to consider new approaches and models to health and wellness for college students? In what ways is this particularly true for BIPOC and trans students and other marginalized students? And either one of you can take that first and we can – And have you both answer it though? Inge?

Inge Hansen:
Yeah. So I think about this a lot. I feel like it’s important to be thinking about new approaches because there’s so many realms of our lives. Here elsewhere, we keep doing things in a certain way, not necessarily because it’s the best way or the most effective way, but because it’s the way we’ve always done things. We get into habits and then those things seem right because they seem familiar. And I think this is particularly important to hear because sometimes the way we’ve always done things is an approach. That’s a colonized lens. It doesn’t center the needs of trans non-binary students, BIPOC students and people with other like racialized marginalized identities, right. Or they’re just not even taken into account. And so one of the things that I see with developing new approaches is that it benefits not only those students who have been traditionally marginalized or disempowered, but it really kind of develops everybody because it allows for a lens it’s actually, it’s more inclusive, healthier, and gives us kind of a broader perspective on what mental health and wellbeing can look like.

Raechele Pope:
What would you add to that?

Drea Letamendi:
I absolutely agree. I believe that we started to see this increase in distress on our campuses before the pandemic, right. We started to see these trends where although students were expressing interest in services, you know, those numbers were higher, right? Students have higher levels of mental health literacy, their service seeking. They’re much more aware, you know, this generation is particularly insightful and educated about mental health, which is great. But our institutions have to catch up with that. Right. And what we were seeing were very large numbers of students in need of services. Numbers across campuses were one in 10. Students were experiencing suicidal ideation with suicide. Is, is that the second leading cause of death in, in traditional college age students? So that’s a concern. One in three students were showing levels of chronic depression and you know, nationally students were reporting that stress in particular was impacting their academic success.

Drea Letamendi:
And so to answer your question very concretely, and I’m sure we’ll talk about the pandemic as we have this conversation you know, to be as concise as possible, the pandemic simply amplified those numbers and, and made it more I think made it more of a common conversation not just us in this space right now, but others in our community started to talk about mental health, which is, you know, again, a great thing when we see that dialogue. But what I can, what I can say about the direction is that as we started to see this, this, these levels of distress we also had to kind of shift the narrative and shift the culture. We, aren’t only talking about how stress impacts academic success. We’re looking at the holistic experience of students, which should not be a radical thing, but I, I think is generally different now. How were you successful interpersonally? How are you successful with your identity development? How are you successful with your social belonging your mental wellbeing, all of these things relate to one another intertwine and impact the students’ experience and their ability to reach their academic goals. Certainly. but they also impact one another in the sense that all of these other levels of experience should be honored and given dignity for, you know, in, in the community of college students.

Raechele Pope:
Sure. You know, it’s, it’s really interesting that we had to refocus on that because if you think about the history of student affairs, the tradition of student affairs, it’s talking about dealing with the whole student, the the you know, all aspects of the student. And yet we, again narrowed that so far, and it was all aspects of certain students. And so when I look at your two centers in particular, you highlight the needs of particular populations. And I’m wondering if you can talk about how maybe how and why that is so important on campuses today and how they worked, perhaps the students weren’t being quite served well enough in more traditional centers.

Drea Letamendi:
I can speak to that a little bit. The RISE Center at UCLA emerged in early 2019. And we, we really launched the center based on the increasing, you know, acknowledgement and understanding the research, everything that, that pointed toward more support for students in the direction of their mental wellbeing. And we knew that despite the increase in mental health literacy among students that a traditional counseling clinic wasn’t necessarily the right space for everybody. And there are a number of reasons why that’s the case. So just to name a couple you know, for one, we simply do not have the capacity to see the number of students that we’d like to, and in a traditional counseling clinic, right. There is a very you know, I appreciate that we’re already mentioning how we can decolonize mental health services at institutions.

Drea Letamendi:
I think one of the ways that we do that is to look at our systems and look at this kind of you know traditional service delivery and realize that it’s not necessarily ideal for everybody. So I’ll put it that way. And then second, the reality is that a lot of students can benefit from resilience, building stress management and other wellbeing kind of experiences that don’t have to happen in a clinical setting. You know, those, those experiences can happen at, at something like a resilience center where we have these open spaces for drop-ins counselors and healers available to do mindfulness exercises advising and kind of helping students navigate the really challenging campus that we have around services. How do you get financial support? How do you get academic support? How do you you know, manage other aspects of your life that maybe you don’t necessarily need a licensed psychologist to provide that, but certainly a support person who can, who can kind of get you set in and give you these tools in your utility belt or your, your, your tool belt.

Drea Letamendi:
And, and that has really been the mission of the RISE Center is how can we build the capacity and the experiences of mental wellbeing for the entirety of our campus and, and, you know, do it in a way that’s accessible and inclusive. We don’t ask about insurance. We, you know, only take limited information about the student’s record in terms of, you know, are you a registered student? And sometimes even then we have some exceptions because we know some students fall behind. So this really is about welcoming students to an inclusive space and, you know, even being very direct and concrete, addressing why an institution that is very large and historically PWI, you know, could be a place of belonging for them.

Raechele Pope:
Well, you know, one of the things I’m looking at the website, and that’s the only way I know the RISE Center, but I was very attracted to it. And I realized that one of the things is that it seemed to have, and you can correct me if I’m wrong here. There was also a deliberate focus and attention on BIPOC students as well, so that it somehow was designed to respond to those needs. In addition to all of the other areas that you’ve mentioned, am I wrong there, or is that a deliberate attempt?

Drea Letamendi:
Absolutely. And I think that’s a consequence of kind of unshackling ourselves from some of the systemic components of a traditional clinic, you know, again, not having to attach ourselves. Of course, we’re very mindful about privacy. We ensure that we’re a safe space. You know, there are some things we take into account but we don’t have the same oversight as, as the counseling clinic. And so we can, we can really be innovative and choose choose ways that are liberating for our students. And what we found is that, you know, if you build it they’ll come and what ended up occurring is that many communities of color and many students who didn’t feel well-served by other spaces on campus felt that this was a space that that brought them validation, affirmation space to grow.

Drea Letamendi:
And it’s the partnerships that we can also have with, with, let’s say the LGBTQ center the undocumented allyship center. There are ways that we can kind of partner intentionally to also bring in communities. And, and the final thing, I’ll say, at least in answering your question about this is over the last 18 months you know to put it quite simply the unrest, racial violence, political division that we’ve seen students are very, very eager to have spaces of dialogue and healing, and we were ready. And I think that’s why sort of, we had these welcome arms to to students who in the last 18 months or so felt extremely exhausted from racial battle fatigue from zoom fatigue from the, you know, threats and the harm that has been done to them throughout this sociopolitical era.

Raechele Pope:
Sure. And Inge I see something very similar with the center at Stanford, primarily designed around LGBTQ students, or perhaps solely, you know designed around that. And, and I guess the question is twofold. It’s the previous question, but it’s also this, why did we have to create another center for this, what needs weren’t being met is what I really mean, what needs weren’t being met in our other more traditional counseling center and student services center that this center was able to come out and, and grab.

Inge Hansen:
Yes. Well, first off I’m so enjoying hearing about the RISE Center and I’m hearing a lot of parallels, so this is fun. And yeah, I think I’ll talk about where the needs originally came from, and then it’s really evolved over time. I think there’s been a shift that we’ve needed to keep up with in terms of what the need is. But when I first started at Stanford a lot of students who identified as queer and I’ll just kind of use as inclusive term were just, they weren’t coming into counseling services. They weren’t coming into medical services either. You know, some were, but for the most part, they were steering clear of it because they would hear from their friends or peers, that it wasn’t an environment that was going to meet their needs. You know, they weren’t seeing visible signs that it was a space for them.

Inge Hansen:
And I think was one of our areas of learning, you know, back 10, 12 years ago is that there’s not such thing as a neutral environment, especially I think what may be in any environment. But I think particularly if you’re doing something that feels vulnerable kind of those like white walls and neutral art, you know, that’s abstract and whatever, and magazine like people, whatever, like people don’t read that as neutral. They they’re looking for signs that I belong here. And if you don’t see that, then you’re assuming that this place is not going to get me. And I think that was actually our starting place. And that’s what we saw from survey data and from students reports, and then they to hear it from their peers and then, you know, it was it was an ongoing issue. And so in the beginning we were building this just to have something that students would engage with us and get some of their needs met.

Inge Hansen:
And we had to do a lot of learning around what that looked like. And and we didn’t want to be kind of signaling that we were an environment that could meet their needs if it wasn’t, if we couldn’t back it up, we’re not just going to put a bunch of rainbow flags in a space and say like, we’re cool now. So that was like where we started. Right. So what kind of like training staff to get to the point that students could come in and be met and held, and then for us, like thinking about the needs of students, there’s a significant medical component too. So students who are on a gender journey, what does it look like if they need hormones, if they need surgery, if, if, you know, if there’s, if that’s part of their journey, making sure that we’re not making a referral, which then ends up being a really negative or traumatic experience for them.

Inge Hansen:
So that’s where things started and that’s what the need was in the beginning. Getting people in the door and then giving them a positive experience in the door. And I think from there part of what’s happened is this kind of this walk between how do we make sure that these particular needs are met in a way that isn’t just lip service. But that we’re not kind of siloing one corner of the services so that it’s like these two staff are going to work with students and everybody else works with, you know, you hear people say like regular students and as though anybody is regular and we’re, I think it’s moved from there is recognizing that there’s a lot of components around us, a medicalized system that doesn’t feel good for our students, even if we’re making this concerted effort.

Inge Hansen:
And even if the staff are trained and so on. So we kind of started with here’s some staff who are specialized to let’s train all the staff, so there’s no wrong doors. So everybody’s prepared to some degree to meet the needs of these students to more recently an opportunity to think, should we actually be in a separate building? Is there something around just kind of the history of these spaces that doesn’t feel right. And we have that opportunity recently. And so at this point it’s a mixed blessing, right? Because it’s siloed again in the sense that the main counseling is across campus from Weiland. But I think having Weiland over here offering these counseling and other services right next to wellbeing and a building that doesn’t feel like there’s nothing that feels pathologizing or clinical or anything like that associated with it has been a more recent evolution. And then I think similar to what you were talking about, Drea, like really thinking broadly more broadly about what we mean about wellbeing and flourishing. So yoga and, you know, workshops and conversations and consultation sessions that we’re not just talking about clinical services and training.

Raechele Pope:
Again, I can sit here and talk about RISE and Weiland for a while, because I think there’s much to be instructive. But I think when we look at Stanford and the images that we all have about Stanford from, you know, those of us weren’t on the campus, or look at UCLA in both of the same ways where there are a lot of campuses that aren’t like that they aren’t as well-resourced. And, you know, I know people on the campuses themselves, like we aren’t either, but in terms of that, it looks like, oh, we’re smaller. We can’t, we just don’t have the space or the justification for having separate centers or a couple of centers. So my question then is how I want you to think with our viewers about how colleges and universities address health and wellness of students differently. How should student affairs, who don’t work in those health and wellness related offices address the same issues without the kinds of resources that you might have available? So what are some of the, the basics, what are the things that we can do or should do differently

Drea Letamendi:
Inge, do you want to take that one first?

Inge Hansen:
Sure. So I think some of my first thoughts is feel super broad, but I think one of my hopes is that we really move to thinking about health and wellbeing of students as foundational to the health of the institution. And I know you had made a comment before around just associating with like how it impacts academics. And I think one of, one of my hopes for the future is can we get to a point and to what you were saying before to Drea like that, we see this as just intertwined with the mission of the institution, not kind of like something that’s reactive when there’s a crisis, if there’s a student suicide, if the university gets sued, if there’s bad press but actually like or if students aren’t able to meet their academics, then it’s a problem.

Inge Hansen:
I want us to get to a point that we’re thinking about it beforehand, before there’s an issue and it’s just woven into the fabric everywhere, you know, that’s, that’s my dream. And I think that that means really thinking about services that aren’t necessarily labeled as services, right. That can be everything from the language that’s used on syllabi. You know the language that’s used, if a student is actually getting a letter, it was a study that was done here around if a student’s going on academic probation, just how we phrase that letter. And whether we talk about it as an opportunity for self-reflection and growth, or whether we talk about it as kind of, you’ve messed up. And now you’re going to have a meeting where you’re going to get a finger pointed at you has a long-term effect on how the student does academically later.

Inge Hansen:
And so what I’m hoping is having these conversations that go between like what faculty are doing so that they have some of those tools that make it kind of easy. A lot of them are really motivated, but then it’s about, you know, oh, well, if you can give me that phrase that I can put in the syllabus to mention these things, if you can just give me some of these tools. So each person isn’t having to figure it out for themselves, but like here’s a toolkit you can use. And then you can kind of decide for your own department or your own office or whatnot. What applies to you? I think, I feel like universities do well with kind of a balance of structure and freedom, you know and, and really against for some of us who are in these predominantly white institutions, really like explicitly calling out perfectionism work culture. And, and the ways that those impact the mental health and wellbeing of our students and thinking specifically around psychological safety and, and how that’s really in my mind, kind of the intersection between mental health and wellbeing and equity, inclusion and justice work, right? Like if people aren’t feeling psychologically safe from the beginning, then they’re not going to be able to engage in any of the other resources that we offer.

Drea Letamendi:
Yeah. I love that. I cannot agree more with what you just said and how I would put it in my experience is, is very similar, which is look at, you know, you don’t need a clinical psychologist to do this part, which is to look at the system with intention, with with a great amount of curiosity and, and loving you know, we can say like loving challenge, like a loving approach, but an interrogation, honestly. And so that’s why I love what you just said because it means we have to look at what’s making us unwell. It is very clear that our students are exhausted and tired and stressed. You know, we’re on campuses where we say like, this is the high achieving campus. Well, guess what, you know, all campuses have communities who are goal oriented, who are interested in bettering themselves, who are interested in education.

Drea Letamendi:
That’s why they’re there, right? So I think we dismantle this idea that we’re this elite group that, you know, we have to be perfect that we have to be on our a game. And I think as leaders, and this can speak to your audience if you’re involved in higher education, you need to demonstrate and model humanity and your own setbacks, your own growth, your own development and areas, these gaps. And I think that humility can be really helpful for the development of a campus. Specifically, I’ll be concrete about two things. One is that when I was brought to UCLA, the student affairs division did something really interesting. They decided to create a mental health position that would be in residential life, not, not in sort of the traditional clinic bedded in residential work. Exactly. So my offices and residential life you know, I, I, I don’t necessarily have these 24, 7 hours, but I do have the flexibility to be in, in the buildings and in the dorms and kind of work closely with our first responders, our resident directors, our RAs, and to kind of make it known that mental health and, and generally our mental wellbeing is everybody’s business.

Drea Letamendi:
It’s not just the, you know, these centers that are responsible, but when I talk about suicide prevention and one of the biggest initiatives I started at UCLA was revising the campus suicide prevention model. We call it suicide safe. And when I developed that, one of the biggest messages was, you know, we’re all in this, and we’re all responsible as stewards to recognize someone at risk and to intervene, you don’t have to have a license. You don’t have to be a clinician. You don’t have to be a professor. You could be a neighbor, you could be a roommate, you could be an RA, right. And to kind of bring those skills in and really give our students the competence and confidence to kind of handle that. And then the second thing I’ll say, so, so that’s an example of kind of like, yeah. Be innovative think about your system and what it needs.

Drea Letamendi:
We’re a very large residential community, right? So, so put people in those spaces. So if you’re a commuter campus, think about how you can look at the schedule, look at the offerings and services and, and, and really really kind of question and interrogate previous systems. Then the last thing I’ll say about this in particular is, is it related, which is how allies can raise consciousness in this work. So I might have lived experience as a Latinx person who has been through graduate school and who has kind of seen this, but for folks who are asking, you know, how we can serve our, our students of color better, there is a part of liberation psychology that asks us to take these four steps, one perceive. So, you know, really explore the system and your positionality in that system. What are you contributing to?

Drea Letamendi:
What is, what is your role to recognize? So where do you see white supremacy ideology? Where do you see some of these historical practices and policies that permeate the system? And again, what’s your relationship with that? Right. three now understand. So you’re okay. What did I glean from that observation? Am I ready? Do I have a willingness to step into a change model? And then number four is respond. So this is the long game, right? Are you willing to give up, especially for privileged people, are you willing to give up some parts of the system that serve others? Give others dignity and honor. And, and I think this can be a challenging model, but I pulled this from liberation psychology, because I think it can really apply to what we’re talking about in taking action.

Raechele Pope:
Right. And I think that those, yeah, they can apply anywhere. You know, this is how we create adjusted an inclusive campus by thinking about it this way and not just jumping in, but actually stopping thinking how I’m involved in. And what is the appropriate action in this situation for me. So I think that that’s really powerful. I want to come back to something else that you were talking about, and this is this pandemic, you know, it almost seems like we, can’t not talk about this. And you know, I was listening to someone else say this today, I’ve heard you say that our students are, our students are not okay. I guess is the way to respond. You know, like having come off these last two years of just this intensity and all that pushing down that’s been going on, and that we hear words from people on our campus, from people in society saying, we recognize it’s been hard.

Raechele Pope:
Now do this. You know, we recognize it’s been hard, but let’s carry on as if it isn’t, but the words are there. And I really think maybe we should spend a little bit of time talking about the importance of self care. As we think about these approaches to college, mental health the importance of self-care, the importance of community care, the, you know, and how important they are for college students. And I wanna know how you see the tensions and the realities sort of between those two concepts as we try to more appropriately and more innovatively respond to college, mental college student, mental health, and wellness. Let’s see. And then would you take us for us, start us off?

Inge Hansen:
Sure. I feel like self-care is so important and vital for all of us. And then I’ve gotten to a point that I hesitate to even use the term. I say it, and then it’s like evoking, like white women taking bubble baths or going shopping or something like that. And it, and it’s just, and so I feel like I got to say it and they’d be like, and here’s the caveat. Here’s what I mean, you know, so then I’m quoting Audre Lorde and, you know, kind of like let’s reclaim the term itself. My concern also is that it’s used irresponsibly sometimes. And what I mean by that is that sometimes we are telling by POC, other marginalized students or others to practice self care because we’re not offering community care. We’re saying like, go do this thing to take care of yourself because we’ve created a structure that’s harmful for you.

Inge Hansen:
But it’s on you to find a way to counterbalance that by like making sure you somehow get enough sleep or eat nutritious foods or whatnot. So I feel like when we do that, we’re shirking a shared responsibility. When in fact like self-care and community care are both needed, then one’s not a replacement for the other. To me, self care is something that’s ideally proactive, right? It’s about being present enough with yourself to know what’s needed to keep yourself in balance and replenished which of course, and creating space for those things, which of course can look different for different people. So for some of us that might literally be a bubble bath, but it could also be like a low in times, slowing down exercise, seeking a friend, meditating, you know, boundaries, all those things. Right. And, and then I feel like community care also, right at its best, it’s proactive, it’s anticipating the needs that might be there.

Inge Hansen:
Not only, you know, a crisis happens where somebody is harmed or there’s an incident nationally and like, oh, we should talk about this. If our first conversation about race is after George Floyd, then we have a problem. Right. but it’s like if the larger community is anticipating, likely needs thinking about them and creating a structure so that when stuff happens, we have a space to walk into, right. You know, where their support’s already there, which can look like community centers. It can look like RISE or Weiland. Right. It can look like support groups, just visibility. What you see when you walk around campus can, if you feel seen than you are, you feel more cared for. And then how we do communicate when stuff happens, when stuff goes down all of those feel like they interconnect as long as we are making space to hold both.

Drea Letamendi:
Yeah. Yeah. Oh, that’s so, you know, yes. It’s, it’s absolutely kind of it saddens me almost that self care has become so commodified and is almost performative now. And I think that really intersects with identity in so many different ways. So for those who identify as women, the, some of the pressures involve sort of this external representation of self care, how we look and how kind of that message is to people that we’re fine and we’re not fine. You know, but we’re still kind of keeping up with society’s pressures around what care or self care looks like. So I am in agreement that one of the things we do in this work is to recognize this has gotten away from us a bit and to kind of pull it back. I love what you said, reclaim the term and, and the process.

Drea Letamendi:
I might use words like, you know, authentic self care, candid self care. And sometimes I’ll just talk about resilience building as, as a way to kind of remind folks this is a dynamic ongoing process. We’re all deserving of accessing our own resilience. This isn’t an extra ordinary thing. We kind of have to dismantle resilience too. Right. all of us have the capacity for resilience and frankly the belief that if we were to continue to withhold resources and services from underserved people, that they will reach this resilient potential is damaging to. So I think all of this work involves really naming and defining what it is that we’re doing as we contribute to, to these spaces. What I will say about the pandemic in particular is that we are continuing to grapple with what’s called the echo pandemic, and I want to acknowledge we’re still in the crisis.

Drea Letamendi:
I definitely name that. We’re still in the crisis and we’re approaching the echo pandemic for many many in the mental health and psychology discipline. This means that we will continue to experience the psychological, emotional impact of this crisis for years to come. And we are starting to see already the, where the vulnerabilities are. If you live in Los Angeles county and you were black or brown, you were two to three times more likely to contract. COVID you were of course, less likely to receive accessible high quality medical services. And you know, that has to be recognized that the economic, the financial, the occupational impacts that this has had is disproportionately affecting our communities of color. The American Psychological Association issued a report that named communities of color, young people and essential workers, which I think a really comprised, you know, a lot of our communities fit these groups. A lot of us fit these groups, right? And so it really hits home that we will continue to experience the demand. And so for us I mean, this conversation is so important because as healers and helpers, we also need to contribute to our own care and compassion and not let all of this harm, you know, really really create the toxicity in us and our helping community. And I think this is something that is so important to talk about pretty openly, you know, with our campus.

Raechele Pope:
No, that is such a key piece there because we’re talking about students and our focus is on students because that’s who we focus on. That’s what that’s, that’s what our job is. That’s what we are called to do so to speak. But at the same time, those of us who are working to lift those students to be there for those students are not paying attention to ourselves in this same process and the need to do that. I know that I hadn’t been away in a long time and for the first time, you know, like anybody, right? So the first time I took off for Labor Day weekend and went to visit a friend, and it was probably the first time in almost two years that I had done this. And I found myself finally having some space to think about how much I had pushed down and hadn’t paid attention to.

Raechele Pope:
And I look at my colleagues in the same way, the colleagues who are battling with some of these issues within their families and how they’ve been pushing down. And so this is just a shout out to all of those listeners to remember that this, this, the self care, this focus on self has to begin with. You put your own mask on first, so to speak before you put it on the next person. But I want to switch because I really want to give some folks some concrete tips, some ideas, some places that they can begin to provide some more innovative approaches for their campus. So I was wondering if you wanted to share a couple of examples from, from Weiland or RISE that might be helpful, or maybe some initiatives that were particularly impactful or had a particular impact or meeting for your students or something you folks haven’t done, but if given the time or the resources or whatever, this is something you would Institute. So I’m just looking for some, in a sense, some concrete ideas about what they can do on their campuses now.

Drea Letamendi:
I can speak to a couple of concrete steps that I think are achievable. In the beginning of this process, we formed a task force and, and really gathered the folks in in our students affairs division who were already doing some of this work. And I think that’s probably the place to start is to acknowledge that on probably all of our campuses. There are people who are already taking the steps to place resilience into workspaces, into student spaces. And it’s so important to recognize that. And that’s the first question is who’s doing it. Where is it happening? A lot of times, student leaders are taking this on, include them in the conversation, give them paying jobs to do this, recognize their inherent and learned talents related to how well they know their community. I can maybe bring in some examples from my own lived experience as a student, but that’s that’s approximating, you know, what students are experiencing now.

Drea Letamendi:
So it’s always important to include their voice. When we formed this task force, we really were just looking at what’s happening and who’s in this space. And then it’s also important to kind of know that there are going to be, there are going to be professionals who may not be ready or want to take on innovation who are sort of not, you know, mentally prepared if they’ve done it before. And they feel an experience of, of repeated setbacks. And so it’s important, I think, to recognize that you’re really looking for willingness eager folks. And, and to understand that like, it’s okay, that not everybody is cheerleading this and not to voluntold voluntary people to be involved. And then a little bit more with a little bit more specifics. I think what, what we started to realize as we were putting the RISE center together is that relationships were key. Absolutely key.

Drea Letamendi:
It’s that impression management we had to do educating our faculty, talking about the connection between wellbeing and academic success, right? Talking about with again, gentle and loving approaches toward the system that is making us unwell and creating a healthy partnerships with established people services processes, practices, so that we’re not, you know, out there alone trying to figure all this out. It really is about having partnerships. I think what is the most I don’t know. I hate to use the word exciting, but really what pulled me in was the opportunity to contribute to the culture on the campus related to mental health and wellbeing. So specifically, you know, Ingo was talking about the, the fact that some students simply don’t feel welcomed in these traditional spaces. One of the things that was so important for me in this work was to be embedded in, in the activities, in, in, you know, be among student organizations and gatherings and say who you are, you know, for students to be like, wait, you’re a psychologist, you do this. They don’t some don’t make that connection with with our caps, you know, our counseling center and a very powerful part of this is the impression management, the public health education, the ability to say to students, no, you are welcome in health and wellness. Like you belong in those spaces and I’m, I’m going to, you know, help you get there.

Raechele Pope:
Thank you.

Inge Hansen:
First off. I just, I want to highlight a couple of, I love what you said, Drea, and a couple of things just want to echo or lift again, is, you know, student voices and making sure we’re compensating students for their time. You know, just making sure that we’re acknowledging that their time’s valuable and then the relationships piece. So many times from a clinical perspective, students have come to see me after I did an outreach event or after I did a talk like once they know me as a person, it’s much easier to come in and get support. And so just like how that feels so different from, you know, what it must feel like to be a student walking in and talking to a stranger for the first time about something so vulnerable. I also wanted to mention a few things that are just going to have some concrete things that we’ve done, that I feel like aren’t particularly high cost, but have had a lot of impact.

Inge Hansen:
One of those is with our we in our counseling center, we do have a training programs. We have pre doc and post-doc training the psychology trainees. So shifting one of those postdoc positions, just to have a specialty around gender and sexual identities, we attract people who have that interest. And then it also puts a responsibility on us to then make sure that we’re on top of our game and that we know what we’re talking about. We create that training experience and then they push us back in turn. And then we’ve created a number of programs for trainees that we then require a trainees, but then try to make attractive enough that all staff will want to join. And then that can shift the culture of the whole team. So one of those is having this, an ongoing GSI consultation group that we invite all clinicians to.

Inge Hansen:
And so any students that are talking about anything related to gender or sexuality, sexual health, they can come in and get support, or they might come in for the whole year. And then at the end of the year, we have a 10 week training. That’s more of a seminar. That’s, it’s more of a deep dive. And I think it pulls us away from this idea that a one-time workshop can really tell you what you need to know around a topic that’s as nuanced as this. Sometimes I think that can do more harm than good, like, oh, I went to the workshop, I’m cool. I’m at the end of the 10 weeks more often, people are like, I didn’t realize how much, I didn’t know, but that’s kind of where we want them, you know, I’m better equipped, but I’m more aware of some of my own foggy spots, you know?

Inge Hansen:
We do – And then also kind of the training front, we do a big queer field trip each year. We go, we take a whole group of staff, whoever wants to sign up, we go into the city into San Francisco and they have just an immersive learning experience around places that have historical or cultural significance around history culture, and then wellness related resources. And it’s very different, you know, to experience something live, be in it when you’re in their space. And have people talk about their experiences what’s out there, then learning something, you know, from a book or from the person in the classroom. And another thing that students have really appreciated is we’ve traded a trans guide. And so for trans students, especially those who are trans and non-binary students just coming into campus, it can be so overwhelming. Like my ID card has the wrong name on it.

Inge Hansen:
How do I know that I can get matched with the right kind of roommate? I need medical services, but like, I don’t know who to talk to. So it just goes through all the resources on campus, through a gender lens and what’s available to them where, and so we’re kind of that relationship piece Drea was talking about. We’re kind of as much as possible trying to build that for them here is the person at the ID office that you can talk to about this. Here’s where you find that, you know, gender inclusive restrooms map, you know, all those kinds of things. And so then that’s something that we have that we’re then trying to just update every year. And then that’s a great experience for a trainee to do the post doc comes in. And then that’s how part of how they learn campus is getting to know that guide and talking to everybody on campus to update it for the coming year.

Raechele Pope:
It was a great idea to have these guides – one, it could cause it’s also an assessment for the campus. If a student has to find this office for any reason, maybe we should do something coming in, so they don’t have to so they get the right name the first time, you know, and those kinds of things. So I like it as both a tool for the immediate and a long-term assessment for the campus. I love these ideas in these suggestions that you have for me and for our viewers. And, and we’re basically running short on time, you know, like, you know, like it’s it’s time and we could keep this going. Maybe we will, after we stop recording. But I wanted to give you a chance for just, you know, some kind of final thoughts, what you want people to walk away with. As we think about indeed Drea, why don’t you start us off?

Drea Letamendi:
Thank you. I believe this conversation is really timely. A lot of campuses are experiencing what they’re calling re-emergent return to campus. You know, post pandemic opening, you know, there’s lots of different ways that we can, we can turn this and it’s an opportunity for a lot of us to reflect on all these lessons learned related to our own resilience building, but also what students have been telling us for the last 18 months. You know, we’ve not, we’ve not been separated from them. Emotionally we’ve been connecting with them in these virtual ways. And I think what I would advise is considering this little practice asking our teams, asking yourself and your teams, what were the practices habits know the skills that you learned over the pandemic that really served your wellbeing and made you more intuitive, made you more helping just made you a better you know professional in this work, serving students.

Drea Letamendi:
And then of course the counterpart to that is can you name on your team, in your department, even at the institution, what policies and practices no longer serve the wellbeing of you as an individual and the community. And it could be something as tiny as like, you know, well, I ended up taking a lunch each day. I actually took a lunch and did not get into my, you know, and here I am already back at UCLA hovering over my keyboard with just trying to eat fast. I’ve already kind of left that promise. So again, go back and, and, you know, maybe there are small things you can do, but there are also very I’d say very innovative things that you can do if you can discard some of these kinds of historical practices that you know, were, were actually not as helpful. So this, as we talked about the RISE center, this means, Hey, we actually want to have big virtual spaces. Again. We want to have private healing spaces, dialogue for students who aren’t even yet ready to walk into the RISE center. We can make that available for them. So these are just, you know, small examples of ways that we can build from what we learned throughout this crisis.

Raechele Pope:
Great. Thank you, Drea.

Inge Hansen:
Yeah. I feel like there’s two big things that come to my mind. As we talk about all this today, one is I was mentioning siloing before, but just like finding opportunities for things that are in kind of their own corners and looking at how things can intersect and collaborate. And when I’m saying that, I mean both where we started with like, you know, mental health and wellbeing world and whatever offices you have in charge of that. And then equity, inclusion, justice, world, whatever offices you have in charge of that, like finding opportunities to be talking to each other and integrating your work. And I also mean for those of us working with particular identities going beyond the identities that are, we’re kind of primarily specializing in or charged with. So for us, like thinking about how we can, like, as, as an organization that focuses on folks, how can we think about BIPOC students more?

Inge Hansen:
And if you’re focusing on BIPOC students, how can you think about in particular students with disabilities or students who are first gen low income, like how can we kind of expand to hold more identities outside of the ones that we’ve typically centered or served? And another thing that in terms of a concrete piece, that’s been really useful for us as a framework when we’re working with students, but also as we’re doing the work, is this knowing being, doing framework. So many of us love to jump into doing, and sometimes that’s exactly the thing to do. We do this conscious process, right, as spending some time and then knowing, and the being what do we know about this situation or this student, and then what do we think we know that we need to unknown, right? Like what have we learned and what assumptions, what am I filling in that I might not even have been aware of doing that I need to step back and not fill in in order to see this more fully and accurately. The being is like, what is it like sitting with this? And how do I want to sit with this and getting clear on all of that before we’re like, here’s the plan, here’s the next step? And so on.

Raechele Pope:
Right. You know again, even your final thoughts as connected as they were to everything else we were talking about, it’s a session of itself, you know, how we can just now dig into the final thoughts that both of you offered. And we’re at a time. So I just want to say right now, I am so grateful for all of your time today Inge and Drea, thank you so much. I’m so grateful for your contributions to this conversation. I think it was really important and I know that this episode is going to be turned around and aired rather quickly. And I don’t know exactly when, but it will be. So I want to send heartfelt appreciation and thanks to our amazing and unflappable Nat Ambrosey who does our behind the scenes production. So thanks Nat. Folks, if you’re listening today and you’ve not, and you’re not already receiving our weekly newsletter, please visit our website at studentaffairsnow.com and scroll to the bottom of the home page and add your email to our MailChimp list.

Raechele Pope:
And while you’re there, check out our archives, lots of great videos there. And if you found this conversation helpful, please share it on your social media platforms and share with your colleagues and your students. Also, please subscribe to the podcast and invite others to subscribe, share on social media, or leave a five star review. It really helps conversation like these reach more folks and build a learning community. Finally, I also want to say, or send a really big shout out to our sponsors. We really appreciate their support. So let’s talk about Everfi our first sponsor today. How will your institution rise to reach today’s socially conscious generation? These students rate commitments to safety, wellbeing, and inclusion, as important as academics and extracurriculars. We talked about that in this session. It’s time to reimagine the work of student affairs as an investment and not an expense for over 20 years ever.

Raechele Pope:
Everfi has been the trusted partner for over 1500 colleges and universities with nine efficacy studies behind our courses, you will have confidence that you’re the standard of care for students, safety and wellbeing, with the results to prove it transform the future of your institution and the communities you serve. Learn more at Everfi.com/studentaffairsnow.

Raechele Pope:
Our second sponsor leadership LeaderShape partners with colleges and universities to create transformational leadership experiences, both virtual and in person for students professionals, and with a focus on creating a more just caring and thriving world. LeaderShape offers, engaging learning experiences on courageous dialogue, integrity, equity, resilience, and community building to find out more, please visit www.LeaderShape.org forward slash virtual programs or connect with us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram, and LinkedIn at LeaderShape. So please folks take time to visit our sponsors and learn more again, I’m Raechele Pope. Thanks again to both Drea and Inge today and to everyone who’s watching and listening. Look, I’ve been really thinking about John Lewis these last few months, so go out there and make some good trouble. Thank you.