MaryFrances McCourt, IU senior vice president, chief financial officer and treasurer, educated members of the BFC on Affordable IU, an initiative aimed at stabilizing tuition increases, providing financial aid, increasing financial literacy, reducing direct costs and encouraging on-time graduation.
To encourage on-time graduation, the initiative encompasses current programs, such as the Summer Tuition Discount Program, the new Office of Completion and Student Success, the new Graduation Progress System and the Finish in Four, a tuition freeze for juniors and seniors set to graduate in four years.
Furthermore, undergraduate financial aid has increased by $281 million in the past seven years, ?McCourt said.
This has resulted in a $31-million decrease in undergraduate student debt, McCourt said.
Matthew Gough, INPIRG campus organizer, was also scheduled to present about open textbooks. Due to time constraints, however, Gough is now set to present during a Bloomington Faculty Council meeting ?in January.
Chris Meno, coordinator of outreach and consultation at the IU Health Center, also spoke to members of the BFC about Counseling and Psychological Services, particularly the role of faculty in encouraging ?students to take advantage of CAPS’ services.
In an average classroom of 100 students throughout the past 12 months, 18 students will have been diagnosed with depression , seven will have seriously considered suicide and 1.5 will have attempted suicide, Meno said.
Only 15.6 percent of these students will have taken advantage of University counseling services, ?Meno said.
Students seeking help are most likely to reach out to their peers, followed by their associate instructors, teaching assistants and then their professors, Meno said.
Students are unlikely to reach out to counselors, Meno said.
“So it’s so important that you know more about the counseling center, because you are going to be the eyes and ears who are going to run into these problems much more frequently than the counselors,” she said.
Professors, however, may feel it is not their place to reach out to their students, fearing they will upset or embarrass their students by reaching out to them or feeling that they don’t know how to reach out to their students, Meno said.
She said faculty should nevertheless reach out to students.
“If there’s one thing that I want you to take away from this presentation, it’s that students say that encouragement from others, or lack of encouragement from others, to seek help makes a huge difference,” ?Meno said.
Faculty should therefore merely encourage the student to seek help, ?Meno said.
“Picture yourself on this side of the bridge with the student,” she said. “The counseling center is on the other side. We are not going to ask you to carry them across the bridge. We are not asking you to fix all their problems so they don’t need to come to the counseling center. We are asking you to do what you can to support them as they walk across that scary, shaky bridge.”
