With 20,000 students enrolled at LBCC, a third of the students at the school deal with mental health issues, even though there is support for these students at the school, it is only the bare minimum.
Most of these students deal with mental health issues like anxiety, depression, eating disorders and bipolar disorder.
Even though the school tries to help these students they are doing it in the wrong way.
The school has mental health wellness workshops, but the workshops don’t go into detail on the issues that these students are dealing with.
Most of these workshops have to do with making crafts to help lower anxiety and relieve stress.
Workshops aren’t well advertised so it results in low attendance.
There are mental health services offered on campus like therapy and information on the different mental health issues but many students don’t know about these resources.
The school struggles to understand that these mental health issues may lead to students struggling in their classes and students shouldn’t be punished if their mental illness is hindering their grades in school.
Once a month for the workshops is not enough and there needs to be more held throughout the semester.
The workshops need to be more consistent, at least twice a week to help students improve and be able to talk about their issues in a group with support.
Even if the therapy on campus helps the student, the student is only allowed six sessions of therapy, then the student will have to find therapy that the student pays for.
The main reason this doesn’t happen is because the school doesn’t want to spend more money or hire more staff in order to help make these workshops better for students.
The school thinks they’re offering enough help for students, but all they are doing is putting a bandaid on a bullet hole.
The school needs to advertise the mental health services like the workshops, therapy on social media and on the website so that more students can get help that will improve their future.