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Writing For The Media Professional focused on journalistic writing. The class also discussed the “hero’s journey”, writing for the web, and writing screenplays. I learned so much during this class. One of the main skills I think I have now is writing structures like the delay, 2-3-1, kabob, and the hourglass. I also learned what to look for when writing journalism like conflict and characters. I also learned how to recognize character archetypes and steps of the hero’s journey.

When I wrote my news feature I decided to write about mental health because it’s something I think about a lot. I decided to interview members of CAPS and Active Minds. Then I wrote the news feature with the suggested “kabob” style. I wrote the lead first then the source information and interview quotes. After that, I went back to write the “nut graph” with information from the research portion of the project. I realized that I didn’t have quite enough relevant information so I went back to do more research. After having Ben edit my paper I decided to read the entire thing out loud. Reading it out loud actually did help me fix a lot of things because sometimes when I’m writing I skip words.

When writing my screenplay I had a couple of ideas of what to write about. I designed characters in the past but I never wrote stories for them. Although I couldn’t find my notebook I did remember some vague details about the characters. I read the first 10 pages of the GLOW pilot and Lady Bird screenplay to understand the formatting. Once I started writing the screenplay I really tried to envision that I’m watching some indie movie. When writing dialogue I don’t think it’s always important to make them sound super realistic because a lot of the dialogue is exposition and plot driving. Writing out plot points and character bios help me with the direction of the script.

I actually enjoyed writing the screenplay more than any other assignment in the class. I’ve tried to write screenplays in the past but it’s been hard to be motivated. Considering we had a short time limit to write a screenplay I really felt inspired to write. I think I will look into taking the Screenwriting class even though I was hoping this would be last writing class I would have to take. I was very nervous to take this class overall I think it went really well.

Mental health among students has become a growing concern across the world. From #WorldMentalHealthDay promoting awareness to celebrities opening up about their mental health struggles, people have become more open about the topic than ever.

At Oregon State University, many staff members have dedicated their lives to making sure that students have proper access to mental health resources. One of those people is Tess Webster-Henry, who is one of the Mental Health Promotion Coordinators for the Counseling & Psychological Services at OSU.

Oregon State has a variety of programs, groups, and services to improve the wellness of students on campus. CAPS offer sessions with counselors and group sessions. Including a variety of events like Paws for Destress where students get to hang out with therapy dogs. They also have tools to improve student’s overall well-being such as The Mind Spa. In The Mind Spa students can participate in meditation, use massage chairs, or do light therapy.

There are also some digital services that OSU offers like a texting alert system. Another service that is offered is Mindful @ OSU. This is a weekly email newsletter that gives students challenges, suggestions, playlists, and apps to improve their self-care.

Along with the school work to improve the lives of the students, there are also groups on campus dedicated to improving student’s well-being. One of these group is called Active Minds. Active Minds is dedicated to changing the conversation around mental health at college campuses. Another topic they are committed to is helping students have social experiences and build social interaction skills.

An increasing number of students have been seeking out mental health treatment, although many schools have inadequate or nonexistent mental health programs. According to Introduction to the Special Issue on College Student Mental Health, this has led to a growing number of students to call for health awareness education and resources for their schools since the early 2000s.

It is believed that the number of students with mental health problems has been increasing over the recent years according to the Center for Mental Health Services. These issues include anxiety disorder, bipolar disorder, and panic attacks. Having problems like depression, anxiety, and stress can lead to a negative effect on students’ schoolwork and health.

According to the American College Health Association, Over 16 million people attend college and universities in the United States. The Suicide Prevention Resource Center reported that one-fifth of college students have a mental illness.

According to a study from the Anxiety and Depression Association of America, seven out of ten adults in the United States have reported experiencing stress or anxiety daily. In the USA almost 10% of United States students have been diagnosed or treated for depression in the past 12 months. Through data from Franciscan University, they found that visits to their counseling center have gone up 231% in the past four years.

Webster-Henry spends their day working diligently on the fifth floor of Snell. In the CAPS offices, Tess writes numerous emails a day while surrounded by CAPS event posters and listening to the sounds of a relaxing fountain on their desk. Tess is involved in coordinating events, groups, and programs to build a stronger campus community.

Webster-Henry explained that college can be a stressful environment. Webster-Henry stated the importance of college students looking after their mental health like they would their physical health, “it’s important for young adults to have more autonomy and be aware that mental health is something that needs to be taken care of.”

Tess points out that mental health is important everywhere. In college students are learning to take care of themselves. For students to be successful in their academics students have to be aware of problems that could be preventing them from functioning at their optimal.

Statistics from the National Mental Health Association show that the second leading cause of death among college-aged students is from suicide. Their research has found that more than 1,000 on campus suicides happen at universities each year.

Tess’s job focuses on making mental health campaigns and events. This also involves coordinating outreach for workshop and presentations. They are also working on a peer-to-peer mediation program called “BEavers HERE NOW.”

Webster-Henry explained that all the programs they create are from needs seen on campus. These needs can come from a survey, a request from a student group, or problems the staff sees on campus. Webster-Henry said, “it can come from a variety of means but mostly we try to be student driven and see what students are requesting.”

Tess Webster-Henry in their office in Snell.

Tess was also the creator of a mental health newsletter called Mindful @ OSU. When Tess was hired at Oregon State part of their job was focusing on mindfulness. Since Tess had experience working on email newsletters in the past, they felt like making a newsletter for Oregon State was a good fit.

The newsletter now provides students with resources like apps, polls, and weekly challenges. Webster-Henry said newsletter currently has around 600 subscribers with a click rate of about 50-60% percent compared to around 16% of a normal email newsletter.

Webster-Henry has received a positive response to the newsletter. Similar to other aspects of Tess’s job the newsletter also focusses on which sections get the highest engagement. The newsletter also calls for ideas from reader each week.

Tess pointed out that a lot of work has been done to destigmatize mental health. Although different cultures and communities have different barriers around mental health, Tess believes that it’s still useful to get the message out to everyone so those who need it can find help.

Another organization on the Oregon State campus is Active Minds. Active Minds is nationwide with a chapter at OSU. Active Minds is a student lead group that holds events to help bring students together with social experiences and interactions.

Amber is a second-year graduate student who studies College Student Service Administration. Her focus topic for her studies is student mental health education and promotion. Amber joined the club over a year ago because she felt it would be a great way to give back to the campus.

Tess Webster-Henry is also the supervisor for Active Minds. Amber expressed her gratitude for how much Tess has helped with their club. Active Minds often collaborates with CAPS because of their shared message.

When talking to Active Minds President Amber Houck discussed how strong the club was in 2014 before it started to fall apart. Now the club has started to hold successful events again. Most recently the club held a “speed friending” event. This event allowed students to meet new people and socialize. The event was so successful they had to ask people to leave at the end because they ran out of time renting the space.

When explaining her goal for the club Amber said, “my objective with the club as a whole is to really empower the members that are part of it. To recognize their own leadership capacity’s and their own abilities to impact the campus and mental health in a positive way even if that is untraditional.”

She continued “I spent the last year working on providing community building for the club members and looking at how can we as a group provide with our campus with something beneficial. So our work this year in particular and what’s probably going to become the overarching emphasis of Active Minds at Oregon State is the idea of relationships.”

A large part of the Active Minds group is relationship cultivation. Amber explained that relationship is intimately linked with mental health on campus. Students who feel lonely or like they don’t belong are more likely to have mental health struggles.

Amber points out that it is important to create a positive environment for students because they are already a high-risk population. “The majority of mental health and mental illnesses first occur in young adulthood. So between 18-24 years old.”

Tess Webster-Henry believes the strongest asset that CAPS has is the staff. Webster-Henry explained that they are really caring and hardworking. They believe that with all the stress happening in the world the staff does a really good job working with students.

Carlee Carlee agrees with Tess that the biggest strength that the department has is the staff. Carlee Connor is a psychology student that works with Tess Webster-Henry and Bonnie Hemrick on the CAPS social media. Bonnie Hemrick is the Mental Health Promotion Specialist for CAPS who works closely with Tess for mental health promotion at OSU.

Connor described the staff as driven, good people who are making a change. Their staff members are working to create a “culture of care” on the campus. She decided to join the staff after having positive experiences using their services.

Connor really enjoys working with the CAPS staff and helping to improve students’ lives. “Some of the most meaningful moments at this job- I have a lot of conversations with people about mental health and about their mental health. Sometimes really difficult situations are brought to us but sometimes we’re able to provide the right information and resources and you can just feel that person’s sense of relief knowing that there is a support service for them. Those moments are really rewarding for me.”

Although, both Carlee and Tess agree that the main weakness of CAPS has is the high demand for counselors. They only employee 20-25 counselors so for the drop-in session the wait times can be very long. CAPS is hoping to improve this with the Single Session Clinic that allows students to schedule 45-minute sessions online.

The Single Session Clinic opened earlier this year and has been successful so far. The Single Session Clinic is located outside of the normal counseling services in Snell. CAPS is going to hold the sessions in the Memorial Union to help students who are worried about being seen going to Snell.

The staff at CAPS is always paying close attention to changes they can make to their programs to help improve the wellness of the students. When deciding what to do with future programs CAPS created a Mental Health Needs Assessment which 1500 students participated in.

The survey had written responses that asked about how students experience mental health on campus along with what kind of barriers they experience. The survey asked students suggestions for helping with their barriers and the problems that students are experiencing to prevent them from seeking help on campus.

With the survey result, they identified problems that were consistent throughout different population groups. From the Mental Health Needs Assessment CAPS decided to create five committees to focus on the most discussed problems.

Amber explains how this project came about. “One piece I think is really honorable that I was very impressed to see was the Mental Health Promotion Coordinators in CAPS, Bonnie Hemrick and Tess Webster-Henry, they chose to seek out this data because they noticed that what’s going on isn’t enough.”

One of the projects they are creating is a peer support network, another is designing an interactive portal, one focuses on bringing mental health discussions to the classrooms, a fourth is for promotion and awareness, and the last focuses on resilience skill building.

CAPS is training staff and faculty to become more of a resource for students. The promotion and awareness groups job is making sure that students know about their resources.

They are received a lot of feedback about students not wanting to go to CAPS but want to connect with someone who is a student. This is what lead to the creation of the peer support network.

Resilience skill building is for students who recognize that they are struggling but are unsure how to make it through. Amber explains, “what resilience skill building does is giving students tools to be able to work through those tough situations and be successful on the other side rather than falling into that feeling of hopelessness or despair.”

The interactive portal would provide students with an online quiz to direct them to the resources they might need. There a lot of different programs offered at OSU but it can be difficult to find which one would help in a certain situation.

CAPS is planning on implementing these changes to campus in the fall of 2019. They continually plan to listen to students to build programs that suit their needs.