According to the American Psychology Association, “Since the mid-1990s, there has been an alarming trend on college campuses nationwide: an increase in the number of students seeking help for serious mental health problems at campus counseling centers.” Here at Hamline, student demand for counseling services has become that much more important.

Hamline University’s Counseling Services office consists of the director of counseling services, a psychiatrist and four counselors. Some people of the Hamline community feel there is not enough availability to help the 3,734 students on campus. During an overflow of counseling-seeking students last spring, many students were turned away when wanting to schedule an appointment.

Because counseling is a vulnerable topic, all of the names of the students mentioned have been changed, unless signified as otherwise.

“Everyone should have access to it [counseling],” Michael Smith, a full-time undergraduate Hamline student said.“Personally, I think If you don’t have someone to talk to I strongly suggest counseling because it’s amazing.”

Smith said that he found Counseling Services this fall through an organization on campus. After facing some family troubles this past year he felt it was of the utmost importance to talk to a professional about them.

“[In] my circumstance,” Smith said. “I was very adamant about getting in as soon as possible.”

However, not all students may be ready to advocate for themselves if told that Counseling Services is too busy.

In another case Mike Delz, who is now on a leave of absence, recounted his experience with Counseling Services.

“I went in, in person and I was told that there was a waiting list, but that I could get a preliminary meeting with someone,” Delz said.

Delz’s meeting was scheduled two weeks after he initially asked for the appointment. He explained that because of how far out it was, he ended up having to cancel because of work and was never followed up with.

“Looking back with some hindsight, I was in a terrible headspace at the time and they didn’t make any effort to reach out to me,” Delz said. “When you have time to let those feelings stew and multiply and grow into other things in your brain, it can seem like you’re okay, but really you’ve worked through it in an unhealthy way…I think timing is really important with mental health things.”

Delzended the interview explaining his experience at Hamline could have been different if he had been able to get the help he needed at the beginning of last year’s spring semester.

“I mean, I’ve left Hamline now,” Delz said. “If I had gotten the help I needed, things could have turned out differently, or even if they didn’t they could have been easier.”

In another case, full-time undergraduate student John Taylor echoed Delz’s feelings about Hamline Counseling Services customer service.

“Each experience was just not very good,” Taylor said,  describing his interactions with Hamline Counseling services this year. “So I am going to see the psychiatrist tomorrow, and when I walked in and saw that the receptionist was a counselor who I had worked with before, I walked up to her and said that I was ready to set up an appointment, and she said, ‘Oh okay, what’s your name?’ and I just thought, ‘You don’t know my name? I spent hours with you spilling out my life. I get [that] you see a lot of people, but all counselors see a lot of people.’” Taylor said that this made him feel uncared about. “From what I can see, it seems that they are really understaffed and could use more professionals in the office.”

This last interviewee preferred her name be shared.

Shelby St. Pierre, a 2016 alumna, communicated her experience with Counseling Services last spring when she was brought there by a Hamline Professor. She explained that there was a day when she felt very detached from the world and that after having a panic attack in class she walked to a trusted professor’s office closeby.

“He walked me over [to Counseling and Health Services] and he pretty much talked for me, because I was pretty much shut down,” St. Pierre said, “and no one was there to talk to me.”

She said that they couldn’t schedule her in, and so the professor drove her home.

“They need more staff. They need more counseling, they need more counselors,” St. Pierre said.

Because of scheduling issues, the director of Counseling and Health Services, Jodi Metz, was unable to meet for an interview. To learn more about  Hamine Counseling and Health go to hamline.edu/offices/counseling-health.