SABRINA JENDLY
Staff Writer
Pepperdine’s Counseling Center is now offering free consultations to students. Student Affairs and the Counseling Center is hoping that the removal of the financial barriers will encourage students to come forward with any problems or difficulties they, or others they know, may be having.
“The change came as the result of student focus groups, benchmarking, and a need (for) assessment that was part of a larger University program review of the Counseling Center,” Mark Davis, dean of Student Affairs, said.
Davis added that research demonstrated that some of the reasons why students would refrain from using counseling services included not having the $100 to pay for the 10 sessions, or not necessitating the whole 10 sessions; others did not want their parents to see the fee charged on their student accounts.
About 275 students used the Counseling Center during the 2004-2005 school year. Its clientele normally includes mostly freshmen at the beginning of the academic year, sophomores and a large number of seniors as well. However, the spring semester is the Counseling Center’s busiest time, with seniors stressing about leaving school. When asked about how this change has affected their schedule, the Counseling Center said that students have been coming in at a higher frequency.
“We’re busier than we were last year,” said Heidi Gunderson, counselor at the Counseling Center.
Additionally, the Counseling Center has appointed a new director, Dr. Connie Horton, following Dr. Fred Barnes’ retirement after 17 years in that position. Horton had previously worked at Illinois Wesleyan University in Bloomington, where she was director of that university’s counseling center for four years and had worked on faculty prior to that.
Horton was a big supporter for dropping the fee.
“She provided us with benchmarking data from other universities which showed that the majority of college counseling centers do not charge fees for basic counseling,” Davis said.
Horton and Gunderson also hope that students will be able to use this service more willingly, with more students coming for briefer periods of time.
“We are licensed, qualified counselors who are here to help. We’re here for the big deals and bumps in the road,” said Horton during a phone interview.
Davis agreed.
“We hope the fee elimination will encourage students to come for counseling early, rather than waiting until problems escalate …(and) suffering needlessly,” Davis said.
Gunderson said the most common problem students come in with is stress and anxiety, which if ignored, can escalate to depression.
The Counseling Center offers services not only limited to counseling, but a dietician, psychiatrist, and testing services are available, as well. There is, however, still a fee charged for these specific services.
“I hope (the elimination of the fee) encourages people to come to the Counseling Center as a preventative measure to receive services for free, (and) to broaden (students’) idea of why or when they would seek out services on consultation by staff and professionals …(for) support,” Gunderson said.
09-08-2005