By Emily Salmon

The transition from high school to college marks an inflection point, a time of pronounced change, more responsibilities, opportunities and additional stressors for students; all of which can impact mental health.

According to data from the National Council for Mental Wellbeing, almost  half (45%) of recently-surveyed college students reported experiencing mental health challenges, which can lead them to not finishing their degree. According to a 2024 Lumina and Gallup poll, emotional stress and personal mental health are two of the top barriers to college enrollment and completion of college degrees. About one-third (35%) of currently enrolled students pursuing a certificate, certifications, associate or bachelor’s degree recently considered stopping their program.

The consequences of not finishing a degree can be serious. Many students rely on student loans to finance at least part of their education. The median debt for a student pursuing a bachelor’s degree in Virginia is $25,732. And $10,888 for an associate degree (SCHEV EOM 01). Non-completers who have no degree, but potentially significant debt can compound their mental health issues.

The Challenges

The mental health needs of college students are complex. According to a 2024 report from the Center for Collegiate Mental Health, students are often seeking on-campus mental health support for multiple issues. According to the American Council of Education, fewer than half (46%) of the students who have positively screened for anxiety and depression had received counseling in the past year.

Further complicating the situation, a shortage of mental health professionals exists nationally and in the Commonwealth. According to the Virginia Health Care Foundation, 93 of Virginia’s 133 localities are federally designated mental health professional shortage areas.

The persistent and increasingly complex mental health needs of college students coupled with the shortage of mental health professionals creates a perfect storm impacting students and providers. The increased demand and short supply places burdens on existing providers resulting in large caseloads and for those pursuing mental health careers, the licensure process is time consuming, costly and at times confusing. (National Conference of State Legislators, 2024)

 What Can We Do?

In order to strengthen student outcomes and degree completion rates, institutions and other higher education partners must come together to provide necessary mental health supports to college students and remedy the mental health professional shortage issue. No single solution or single source exists to address these complex problems. Instead, an ecosystem of partners, approaches and supports is necessary to tackle these challenges in the short and long term.

Efforts should collectively focus on:

Addressing both college student demand for mental health services and supply of mental health professionals. While there is no magic bullet to solve these complex, long-term issues, Virginia’s Higher Education Mental Health Workforce Pilot shows promise. The two-year program is a combined workforce and mental health initiative established by the General Assembly in 2022. The pilot program uses funds to underwrite the salary and benefits of an onsite licensed professional counselor or licensed clinical social worker candidate for two years. The five selected public higher education institutions hire, train and supervise the LPC/LCSW candidates until licensed.

Other (non-exhaustive) Virginia efforts to address supply-side issues include:

• Policy, regulatory and licensing modifications specific to mental/behavioral health care professionals (Right Help, Right Now and Behavioral Health Commission)
• Interstate Counseling Compact
• Boost 200
• Virginia Mental Health Access Program

Improving and expanding awareness, education and training of students, faculty and staff on the signs, symptoms and how to connect students in need to the right resources on and off campus. Significant work continues to improve and expand awareness of and education/training on mental health challenges of college students and youth/young adults more broadly. Initiatives such as Right Help, Right Now; Virginia Mental Health Access Program; and Mental Health First Aid training address specific aspects and together with the Virginia Higher Education Mental Health Workforce Pilot, provide a patchwork approach, but more cohesive and coordinated efforts and resources are needed.

Enhancing efficiencies and reducing duplication of efforts across Virginia’s higher education institutions. The current patchwork approach results in holes in terms of provision of these activities and duplication of efforts where shared contracts and increased collaboration can create efficiencies which benefit students, institutions and taxpayers. Such will enable economies of scale and drive down the cost of services, benefitting both students and institutions.

Collecting consistent data to identify and quantify gaps/additional needs and barriers. Student mental health is not a stand-alone issue but connected to so many different facets of a student’s life and experiences prior to and during college. Additional work should recognize and articulate the linkages between college preparedness, sense of belonging, basic needs and student mental health.  A SCHEV study identified a host of recommendations related to each of these issues as well as cross-cutting recommendations to help address them collectively.

Communicating policy and funding needs quantitatively and qualitatively to institutional leaders and policy makers with a unified, collective voice of higher education professionals. Perhaps the most work needs to focus on quantifying gaps/additional needs and barriers and communicating program, policy and funding needs quantitatively and qualitatively to institutional leaders and policy makers. This work is crucial to scaling proven efforts systemwide to shore up necessary resources and effectively serving all of Virginia’s college students in support of their degree completion.