UW System Mental Health Counselors Find New Ways To Support Students During Pandemic

When University of Wisconsin System faculty were scrambling in March to move classes online due to the COVID-19 pandemic, campus mental health counselors were having to find new ways to support students dealing with the added stress.

During a presentation to the UW Board of Regents on Thursday, UW-Whitewater Interim Vice Chancellor for Student Affairs Artanya Wesley and UW-Superior Dean of Students Harry Anderson told board members about the challenges counselors faced in providing mental health services when students were told stay home.

Wesley said the first challenge was maintaining confidentiality during online counseling sessions with students.

“Staff worked with I.T. partners to set up campus-approved laptops with encrypted and secure software to ensure the ethical and professional delivery of services,” said Wesley.

Wesley said staff ran trials to ensure online conferencing platforms like WebEx were secure and stable enough to accommodate therapy sessions. She said other challenges included dealing with counselor licensing requirements, health information privacy rules, and how to provide counseling to students living at home in other states.

UW-Superior’s Anderson said the mid-semester transition to online classes caused some students to experience stress, loss of motivation and anxieties about grades and unknowns created by COVID-19.

“We know students that were struggling by reentering into a traumatic situation or a risky home environment that many times included conflict, in an already difficult situation,” said Anderson. “The students also may have been presented with dangerous situations facing homelessness and food insecurity.”

Wesley told regents counseling staff are continuing their outreach to students via social media, emails and direct phone calls. Anderson recommended that the UW begin a system-wide implementation of online self help portal, SilverCloud.

Thursday’s board presentation comes before an August report on student mental health needs and services throughout the UW System. An April 2019 report from the UW System showed that demand for mental health counseling services had increased by 55 percent since 2015. It also noted that campus counseling offices were unable to keep up with demand, which lead to waiting lists for students.