If I knew at the beginning of my teaching career what I know now, I’m quite sure I would have been more proactive, informed and comfortable advocating for the wellness of my students.

I joined Memorial’s Department of Psychology as a faculty member in 2001 and became director of the Student Wellness and Counselling Centre (SWCC) in August, 2020. Early in my career, I had no idea Memorial even had a wellness center, let alone the kinds of services and programs that could significantly benefit our learners. After six years as director, I now know that faculty and staff need not feel overwhelmed, ill-equipped or alone in supporting students. The SWCC can be a supportive partner.

Despite its small stature, the SWCC punches well above its weight, providing counselling, medical and health promotion services and programs. At a time when access to provincial primary care is sorely limited, enrolling at Memorial gives all students access to everything the SWCC has to offer. Moreover, the fact that the SWCC provides both in-person and virtual appointments mean that students studying anywhere in the province can receive care.

Much of the SWCC’s impact comes from its partnerships with units across and beyond Memorial. This includes its functional alliances with various internal partners—including Student Life, the Internationalization Office, the Office of Indigenous Affairs, Student Residences, the Sexual Harassment Office and Protective Services—and external partners like NL Health Services, the Division of Public Health, the Mobile Crisis Team and Lifewise peer support.

However, to optimize SWCC access and support, we must also strengthen our associations with academic faculties and departments. By understanding the realities affecting student wellness and taking a few practical steps to address them, we can help connect students with support before those challenges become barriers to their learning and sense of belonging.

University students: a vulnerable population

It is a fact that poor mental health will likely affect a notable proportion of university students, particularly undergraduates (e.g., Wyatt & Oswalt, 2013). There are several well-documented reasons for this reality.

Firstly, postsecondary learners face a range of contextual challenges as they adapt to campus life (Arnett, 2000), including novel responsibilities, academic burnout (Pozos-Radillo et al., 2014), financial strain (Fowler & Hesson, 2025; Pozos-Radillo et al., 2014) and interpersonal issues (Darling et al., 2007) such as diminished social support (e.g., Feeney & Collins, 2015; Wood et al., 2018).

University students also exist in a demographic that is overall likely to experience mental illness. A 2019 Canadian survey of more than 55,000 postsecondary students revealed that roughly 24% reported academic difficulties due to depression while approximately 35% indicated academic difficulties due to anxiety (American College Health Association, 2019). Further, these proportions were observed to rise by nearly 10% in the years following the COVID-19 outbreak (American College Health Association, 2022). Based on our own 2021 and 2023 administrations of a questionnaire assessing these same items, Memorial statistics are virtually identical (Fowler et al., 2024).

While mental health challenges may lead to academic troubles, they may also result in institutional disengagement and a weaker sense of university belongingness (e.g., Mulrooney & Kelly, 2020). This is notable as research consistently indicates that strong university belongingness is a central factor in greater motivation for success, higher levels of scholarly self-confidence and engagement (Pedler et al., 2022), a sense of flourishing (Fowler et al., 2025; Jie et al., 2025) and retention (Pedler et al., 2022).

Supporting student wellness

With increasing class sizes, many may wonder how it is logistically feasible to ‘be there’ for students when so many are at risk for mental health issues. While options predicated on resource and budgetary solutions are probably not in the cards, I would nonetheless propose several practical suggestions:

 Affording more flexibility and latitude for assignments and testing (where feasible) will likely ease the pressure on struggling students and foster course engagement and performance.

• Providing students who inform professors and/or staff members about mental health struggles (or voice concerns about fellow students) with SWCC contact information connects them with a variety of integrated and responsive wellness services and resources.
• For students who choose not to disclose wellness issues, SWCC contact information must be ubiquitous and readily accessible—in department offices, on course syllabi, with Academic Program Officers (APOs), etc.
• During lectures and in online class posts, regular efforts to advocate for student self-care, and information on how the SWCC might help, reinforce that everyone is entitled to SWCC offerings and strengthen an association between a student’s sense of their own wellness and university supports.
• To build on faculty awareness and understanding of various SWCC services and programs, a dedicated Student Wellness Advisory Committee (SWAC) may be established with representation from each faculty and other student support units. This group would meet regularly to consider various SWCC offerings, deliberate strategies for responding to particular student needs and hone in on issues deemed essential to specific faculties.
• If anyone is unsure whether/how the SWCC can help students of concern, please contact me

 Supporting student wellness doesn’t require faculty or staff to become counsellors or have all the answers. It can begin with making support visible, responding with flexibility where possible and helping a student make the right connections. According to Maclean’s magazine, we seem to be on the right track, as Memorial’s counselling and accessibility services have been rated highest among all Atlantic universities (Abdi, 2025).

That culture matters not only to student wellness, but also to their sense of belonging and ability to stay engaged in university life. I am convinced that a significant part of retaining students rests with Memorial’s reputation as sensitive and responsive to student wellness and doing everything conceivable to assure student success. I’ll pragmatically concede that we can’t always promise a cure; however, we can always promise to be a university that cares (Patch Adams - The Gesundheit Institute, n.d.).

 SWCC Website: mun.ca/studentwellness / Phone: (709) 864-8500

• For Counselling Appointments, select 'REQUEST COUNCELLING' tab on website.
• For Medical Appointments, select 'BOOK OR CANCEL A MEDICAL APPOINTMENT'  tab on website, or
• Phone: (709) 864-8500, and select ‘Option #3’

References

Abdi, A. (2025, January 1). University with the happiest students in Canada. University Magazine. https://www.universitymagazine.ca/university-with-the-happiest-students-in-canada/

American College Health Association. (2019). American College Health Association-National College Health Assessment II: Canadian Consortium executive summary spring 2019. American College Health Association.

American College Health Association. (2022). American College Health Association-National College Health Assessment III: Canadian reference group data report spring 2022. American College Health Association.

Arnett, J. J. (2000). Emerging adulthood: a theory of development from the late teens through the twenties. American Psychologist, 55(5), 469–480. https://doi.org/10.1037/0003-066X.55.5.469

Darling, C. A., McWey, L. M., Howard, S. N., & Olmstead, S. B. (2007). College student stress: the influence of interpersonal relationships on sense of coherence. Stress and Health, 23(4), 215–229. https://doi.org/10.1002/smi.1139

Feeney, B. C., & Collins, N. L. (2015). A new look at social support: a theoretical perspective on thriving through relationships. Personality and Social Psychology Review, 19(2), 113–147. https://doi.org/10.1177/1088868314544222

Fowler, K., Escoto-Rivera, A. L., Hesson, J., & Button, P. (2024). COVID-related stressors, psychological distress and social support in Atlantic Canadian university students. Discover Psychology, 4(1), 48. https://doi.org/10.1007/s44202-024-00138-1

Fowler, K., & Hesson, J. (2025). The social cost of student food insecurity at an Atlantic Canadian university: exploring the relationship between social support and psychological distress. Journal of Further and Higher Education, 49(3), 400-416. https://doi.org/10.1080/0309877X.2025.2459196

Fowler, K., Wareham-Fowler, S., & Keyes, C. L. (2025). Flourishing despite eating disorder risk: exploring undergraduate student academic, social and mental health outcomes via the dual continua model. Psychology, Health & Medicine, 1-16. https://doi.org/10.1080/13548506.2025.2594167

Healthy Minds Network, & American College Health Association. (2020). The impact of COVID-19 on college student well-being. https://www.acha.org/documents/ncha/Healthy-Minds_NCHA_COVID-19_Survey_Report.pdf

Jie, Y., Jiang, Y., & Saunders, T. (2025). Exploring college students’ flourishing: the interplay of demographic characteristics, time allocation in daily activities and responsibilities, and sense of belonging. Journal of American College Health, 73(5), 2174–2190. https://doi.org/10.1080/07448481.2023.2258409

King, N., Pickett, W., Rivera, D., et al. (2023). The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the mental health of first-year undergraduate students studying at a major Canadian university: a successive cohort study. Canadian Journal of Psychiatry, 68(7), 499–509. https://doi.org/10.1177/07067437221094549

Mulrooney, H. M., & Kelly, A. F. (2020). The university campus and a sense of belonging: what do students think? New Directions in the Teaching of Natural Sciences, 15. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pmen.0000057

Pedler, M. L., Willis, R., & Nieuwoudt, J. E. (2022). A sense of belonging at university: student retention, motivation and enjoyment. Journal of Further and Higher Education, 46(3), 397–408. https://doi.org/10.1080/0309877X.2021.1955844

Pozos-Radillo, B. E., de Lourdes Preciado-Serrano, M., Acosta-Fernández, M., de los Ángeles Aguilera-Velasco, M., & Delgado-García, D. D. (2014). Academic stress as a predictor of chronic stress in university students. Psicología Educativa, 20(1), 47–52. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.pse.2014.05.006

The Gesundheit Institute. (n.d.). The education of compassion: medical students and other health care students, join a revolution in loving. https://www.patchadams.org/gesundheit/ideas/education-of-compassion/

Wood, D., Crapnell, T., Lau, L., Bennett, A., Lotstein, D., Ferris, M., & Kuo, A. (2018). Emerging adulthood as a critical stage in the life course. In N. Halfon, C. B. Forrest, R. M. Lerner, & E. M. Faustman (Eds.), Handbook of life course health development (pp. 123–143). Springer International Publishing. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-47143-3_7

Wyatt, T., & Oswalt, S. (2013). Comparing mental health issues among undergraduate and graduate students. American Journal of Health Education, 44(2), 96–107. https://doi.org/10.1080/19325037.2013.764248