Especially for Faculty and Staff: A Guide to Student Referral and Consultation
If you are a faculty or staff member seeking a counseling referral for yourself rather than a student, please see below Faculty and Staff Seeking Counseling.
The college years can be very stressful for many. In the contemporary climate of competition and pressure, some students adequately cope with these stresses, but others find that stress becomes unmanageable and interferes with learning. In some cases, these students may even disrupt the learning of others.
Click the
links below to find further information:
About the Counseling
Center
Your Role
Guidelines for Interaction
How to Make a Referral
Counseling Center Contact
Information
Seeking Professional
Consultation With Our Staff
Confidentiality
& Consultations
Tips on Managing
Emotionally Laden Classrooms
Student Referral & Support
Program (SRSP)
About the
Counseling Center:
Removing
Barriers to Learning and Life
NSU’s Counseling Center is committed to providing comprehensive, quality services for all students dealing with developmental concerns or psychological problems. The staff of the Center is available to assist students with their personal and social concerns in hopes of helping them achieve satisfying educational and life experiences. Services offered include the following:
- Free, confidential counseling for students
- Consultation for faculty and staff
- Don’t Cancel that Class! provides presentations in classrooms. If you are attending a conference or meeting and need to cancel your classes, DON’T!
- Specialized alcohol and other prevention, early intervention, and support services to students
You, as a faculty or staff member, may be one of the first to become aware of personal difficulties affecting a student or students initially may seek assistance from faculty or staff members. Many students come to the attention of faculty or staff through journal entries or papers. The staff of NSU’s Counseling Center are available to faculty and staff for consultations. Below are guidelines for identifying students in distress:
- Doing more personal counseling than academic advising with a student.
- Excessive procrastination and very poorly prepared work, especially if not consistent with previous work.
- Infrequent class attendance with little or no work completed.
- Dependency (e.g. the student who hangs around or makes excessive appointments during office hours).
- Listlessness, lack of energy, or frequently falling asleep in class.
- Marked changes in personal hygiene.
- Impaired speech and disjointed thoughts.
- Repeated requests for special consideration (e.g., deadline extensions).
- Threats to others.
- Expressed suicidal thoughts (e.g., referring to suicide as a current option).
- Threats to others.
- Excessive weight gain or loss.
- Behavior which regularly interferes with effective class management.
- Frequent or high levels of irritable, unruly, abrasive, or aggressive behavior.
- Unable to make decisions despite your repeated efforts to clarify or encourage.
- Bizarre behavior that is obviously inappropriate for the situation (e.g., talking to something/someone that is not present).
- Students who appear overly nervous, tense or tearful.
- Talk to the student in private.
- Avoid criticizing or sounding judgmental.
- Express concern. Be as specific as possible in stating your observations and reasons for concerns.
- Listen carefully to everything the students says.
- Repeat the essence of what the student has told you so your attempts to understand are communicated.
- Consider NSU’s Counseling Center as a resource and discuss referral with the student.
- If the student resists referral and you remain uncomfortable with the situation, contact the NSU Counseling Center to discuss your concern.
- Do not promise to keep a student disclosure in confidence when it relates to harm to self or others.
How to make a referral to NSU’s Counseling Center:
- Suggest that the students call or come in to make an appointment. Give them the phone number (2371) and location (Student Center 217) at that time. However, it is usually more effective to assist the student by calling for an appointment with the student present. When you reach the Counseling Center receptionist, identify yourself as a faculty or staff member and ask for an appointment for the student. The student’s name is required to make an appointment. You may request a specific staff member or the receptionist can assign one. Write down the appointment time, date, and counselor for the student.
- You may wish to reassure the student that the staff at the Counseling Center are competent and well-trained professionals, and that the services are confidential.
- If you feel the situation is an emergency or urgent enough to require immediate attention, after identifying yourself as a faculty or staff, tell the receptionist that the student needs to see a counselor immediately. Give the receptionist the student’s name, and then ask to speak with an available staff member.
- It may be necessary to walk the student to the Counseling Center.
- If you are concerned about a student but unsure about the appropriateness of a referral, feel free to call the Counseling Center for a consultation.
Counseling Center Contact Information:
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Telephone: |
(605) 626-2371* |
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Location: |
Student Center |
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School Year Hours: |
8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday |
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Summer Hours: |
7:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Monday through Friday |
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After-hours emergencies: |
Northeastern Mental Health Center |
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*When dialing from on-campus, please use only the four-digit extension. |
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Seeking Professional Consultation with Our Staff
Although our office provides counseling services only to students, we are available to consult with faculty and staff about concerns regarding students. Staff and faculty members are invited to call our office and request consultation with a counselor. While we are not at liberty to reveal any information about specific students (including whether or not a particular student has received services here), we can often provide you with general information that may be of help in handling the situation, and you are welcome to provide us with any relevant information you have about the student(s). If no one is immediately available to provide consultation at the time of your call, you will be invited to leave a message. When leaving a message, please include the following information:
- Your name and position on campus
- How you can be reached
- Times that you will be available
- The general nature of your request
- If the situation requires immediate attention, please be sure to state this in your message.
Confidentiality and Consultations
As required by law and professional codes of ethics, all communication between a counselor and a client is confidential. Once a student becomes a Counseling Center client, we cannot discuss his/her situation, or even acknowledge the fact that counseling is being provided, without the consent of the student. However, the Center’s staff typically requests students’ permission to acknowledge referrals; if you do not hear from us, it is likely that permission has been denied. The limits of confidentiality notwithstanding, the staff at the center can always listen to your concerns. Don’t hesitate to contact us to discuss your concerns and explore possible courses of action.
Tips for Managing Emotionally-Laden Classroom Discussions
Sometimes troubling events from outside the classroom have a way of intruding on classroom discussions. Follow this link for some suggestions from Hobart and William Smith Colleges on managing emotionally difficult classroom discussions.
Student Referral and Support Program (SRSP)
Have you ever referred students to one of the help centers on campus, but weren’t sure they ever got there? If so, the SRSP program is for you. The Student Referral and Support Program provides a tracking system for the network of help centers on campus. (To view a copy of the Northern State University 2006 - 2007 Referral Guide in PDF format click here.) The SRSP process identifies students in need of additional services, aids in formal referrals of students to university help centers, and increases the likelihood of students following through on a referral to these services. The referrals are reviewed by a core group made up of representatives from Counseling Center, Insight, Residence Life, Athletic Department, Disability Services, University College and Health Services. The SRSP committee meets at regular intervals to review the names of students referred to various help centers. The purpose of the meetings is to identify students with multiple referrals and to gather needed information about the students from these representatives to get a more complete picture of students’ situation. This provides an opportunity to make any additional referrals or provide the students with more support.
Faculty and staff initiate the process by completing a form and sending it to the Counseling Center. The SRSP graduate assistant (GA) coordinator then tracks whether the students actually obtain the services and provides encouragement to them in the way of a follow-up phone call and letter to help ensure their success. Click here to access the SRSP form. This form also contains the locations of offices. In addition, the SRSP/Retention Coordinator sends an evaluation to the student regarding his/her experience with that help center.
Faculty can also email the SRSP/Retention GA regarding students who are not attending classes and he/she will contact the student(s). The SRSP coordinator will also contact the student’s other professors to determine if the student is struggling in all of his/her classes to see if any patterns are emerging. The faculty or staff member who made the inquiry will then be contacted as to what was discovered.
Faculty and Staff Seeking Counseling
If you are an NSU staff or faculty member seeking mental health services for yourself or an immediate family member, please contact Intercept Employee Assistance Programs (EAP) the counseling service that NSU contracts with for faculty and staff), at (605) 229-4226; outside of Aberdeen at 1-888-226-1236, and identify yourself as a member of NSU staff. Feel free to contact our office if we may be of assistance in facilitating this process. For more information, see Employee Assistance Program.
A Division of Student Affairs
Counseling Center
Northern State University
1200 S Jay
Student Center Room 217
Aberdeen, SD 57401
(605) 626-2371
People have visited this page since August
11,2006.