Honors college introduces in-house mental health services

BY EMILY BRACHER @emily_brahcer_

Mental health and therapy used to be a taboo subject, but now it has become more openly discussed, and the Roger Hadfield Ogden Honors College wants to keep it that way with their new honors college therapist.

LSU alumna Julie Lorio started as the Honors College’s embedded mental health therapist on Jan. 9. The “Honors College Mental Health Initiative” was started by the Dean of the Honors College, Jonathan Earle, after he noticed heightened levels of students dealing with anxiety, perfectionism and depression stemming from when the pandemic began.

“I thought this was a really great use of resources to focus on these challenges,” Earle said.

Lorio provides individual therapy that can be accessed and requested through the Student Health Center. She is also hosting a series of six emotional wisdom seminars that are psychoeducational-based, Lorio said. The seminars will discuss the basics of mental health, coping skills and other related topics.

“It’s a good entry level way to start engaging with a therapist,” Earle said regarding the seminars.

Private donors like Roger Ogden and a partnership with the Student Health Center made having a therapist in the French House possible, Earle said. He said he got impatient waiting for more amenities, so he initiated the prioritization of accessible therapy.

Not only as the dean but also as a professor, Earle has noticed that students don’t just struggle with anxiety and depression separately but that many face both at the same time. He said that a part of him being an academic administrator is that he can do more than give a lecture or a grade. He can make change, he said.

“We have been very successful at LSU and elsewhere in higher education at destigmatizing mental health problems and therapy,” Earle said. “When I was in college, it was like a huge issue. Like no one told anybody if you were seeing a therapist or if you were taking antidepressants, and now, it is just much more open.”

All services are completely covered by the Student Health Center fee in students’ fee bill. Currently, appointments at the French House are primarily focusing on honors students. Lorio encourages non-honors students to reach out to the Student Health

Center for their appointments there if they are in need of help.

“Therapy in general is a great opportunity for you to just gain more insights on yourself and to figure out why we do the things we do and whether or not they are helpful or unhelpful,” Lorio said.

Mass communication fresh- man Julian Zona said it can sometimes be hard to juggle the life and responsibilities of being an honors student while also maintaining a good social and work life.

“Having someone who can be there to understand our struggles

POLLUTION, from page 3 to the project website. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers will be accepting public comments on the plan until Feb. 8.

The project could mean safer travel and air for those who enjoy the century-old, man-made lakes.

But toxic algae blooms aren’t the only thing causing air quality problems at LSU. An environmental event from across the sea can affect air quality here in Baton Rouge.

Such an event happened just this summer, as a wind carried dust from the Saharan Desert

MAINTENANCE, from page 3

Biology freshman Trinity Bullock is troubled by the lack of progress on fixing the doors.

“Four men came to knock on my door when my roommate was home and asked to use our bathroom, even though there’s a public bathroom on the first floor, and we live on the fourth,” Bullock said. “The lack of initiative is unsettling at the least because the safety of the students should be the top priority of the maintenance staff.”

Several residents have had to text their respective hall group chats hoping there’s someone in their room who can open the door for them. If not, they’re left across the Atlantic Ocean and into the southeast, Miller said. The effects the storm had were impossible to miss, as a brown haze hung over the area and the air in the region took a concerning dip in quality. stranded.

“There were air quality advisories issued for this day. Again, that’s not pollution, but the presence of dust in the atmosphere can cause people with respiratory conditions like asthma to have an asthma attack,” Miller said, who has recently been awarded a grant from the National Science Foundation to study these Saharan dust storms.

“I’ve come and opened the door for people who texted in the GroupMe saying they were locked out lots of times, sometimes even at 1 or 2 a.m.,” mass communication freshman Ella Christopher said. “I’ve been locked out a few times myself, and it’s been super inconvenient having to deal with this.”

Early childhood education freshman Sophia Koepplinger said the most frustrating problem is the inconsistency with the elevator working. She also said her bathroom is filled with mold and the toilet recently stopped functioning properly.

“I went downstairs or to my friends’ dorm, and it was very inconvenient,” Koepplinger said. “When we go down to get work orders in, I think that people should gauge the severity of them, because obviously our own toilet wasn’t working, and it took them a day and a half to get to it.”

Such storms aren’t necessarily uncommon, but the extent of dust that reached the southeast was rare, Miller said.

Simpler reasons, like inefficient air conditioning, can impact air quality, too.

“In enclosed spaces such as classrooms, the air quality can decrease due to inadequate air movement,” said Kalliat Valsaraj, a professor of chemical engineering at the university.

Special cases aside, the university’s campus still manages an acceptable air quality in a state that suffers from heavy air pollution.

The South Hall issues add to a long list of complaints about LSU’s residential and academic infrastructure, which the Reveille documented in an infrastructure series last spring.

Herget Hall, for example, was arun with geckos, the Reveille reported in January 2021. Residents also reported problems with the elevator frequently not working, sometimes for days-long stretches, and temperature control issues.

MENTAL HEALTH, from page 3 and help us through these struggles is going to be important for all of us,” Zona said.

Zona said that many students feel ashamed for needing help and that the accessibility of these new services can hopefully change that.

Biology freshman Roland Mollere lives in the Laville honors dorms and believes that a therapist located in the French House will encourage students to schedule appointments because of the shortened distance. Laville Honors House are on a separate

Students in the dorms in the Pentagon Community, built in 1923, told the Reveille about mold, peeling paint, bug problems and poor Wi-Fi. One student said her air conditioning window unit emitted a terrible smell that lingered on her even after she left her dorm. Another student thought the “black fuzzy stuff” on her A.C. was causing her congestion and sickness or making them worse.

Security complaints, too, aren’t unique to South Hall. A Cypress Hall resident told the Reveille that a man got into the dorm and chased him down the hallway. A student living in Acadian Hall told the Reveille her ex-boyfriend managed to bypass several side of campus than the Student Health Center.

Mollere said that specifically amongst kids in the honors college, mental health has become a more of a topic that is discussed and that students are willing to have open conversations about it.

“From my experience in taking one of my honors classes last semester, a lot was proactively talking about mental health and lot of current going-ons in the world about adolescent health,” Mollere said, “It was made to feel like we were adults – we have just the same emotions and needs as other people.” supposed security layers to enter her hall and attempt to meet with her against her will.

Catherine David, associate director of Res Life, said they are aware of the issues with the doors at South Hall and “have technicians on site working on the programming daily.”

She said most of the problems with the elevators happened during move-in and are caused by the doors being continuously held open. The door in South Hall is a year old, so the problem is rarely mechanical, she said.

Any problems can be reported to the Res Life Help Desk, housing@lsu.edu or through a work order in the housing portal, David said.