Wait times for Lauderdale counseling services decrease

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Lauderdale Health & Counseling Center hired three new counselors in February, causing wait times to decrease by 82 percent for students. Wait times now average around four days. (Jenna Harbus/Staff Photographer)

The wait time for Lauderdale Health & Counseling Center has decreased significantly since spring 2016, when Lauderdale was overwhelmed with appointments at the end of the semester. Students previously found wait times to be excessively long.

Lauderdale wait times have been reduced by as much as 82 percent, according to Administrative Director for Student Health and Counseling Dr. Erin Halligan-Avery. This decrease in wait time was made possible by the appointment of three new counselors in February. There is now one 10-month, general practitioner therapist and two clinical case and crisis counselors.     

The clinical case and crisis counselors are available daily to meet with students who have either made first time appointments or who are walking in to see a counselor right away, according to Clinical Director for South Village Counseling Services Dr. Beth Cholette. Following the initial meeting, the counselors then refer students to therapists and other wellness resources should they choose to continue counseling.    

“With them not seeing students on an ongoing basis, we’ve really been able to manage and get students in as needed,” Cholette said. “Really, there’s no wait time. The only wait time is when a student doesn’t want to be seen that day.”

Students who choose to pursue further counseling with a therapist or general practitioner can expect a wait time of around four days, down from the 23.75 day wait time in 2016, according to Halligan-Avery. Problems came about in 2016 due to difficulty in keeping pace with the demand for services, as this demand has only increased over the past 20 years, Cholette said.    

Lauderdale will also offer more support groups and seminar workshops for students to utilize. Among these are Recognition, Openness and Insight workshops, which offer a holistic and mindful approach to stress management across three sessions. 

Other resources include the three wellness rooms on campus, located in Onondaga Hall, the MacVittie College Union and the Lauderdale Health Center. A massage therapist has also been contracted to give 15-minute chair massages to students at the Union every Wednesday.

“We’re trying to create these wellness spaces all over campus where students can relax,” Halligan-Avery said. “Mental health is also stress, and maybe you don’t need long term therapy, but you might like a program that could help you feel less stressed.”

Reception of the new services has been very favorable so far among both students and faculty, according to both Cholette and Halligan-Avery. 

“The students that have used our services love it, but the wider campus still has the view that they can’t get in as quickly,” Cholette said. “We need to get the word out more that you can get in and be seen right away.”

Mathematics major sophomore Jack McAlevey noticed significant changes in Lauderdale’s services even in the fall 2016 semester.

“I was really satisfied with the services I got and also it was really easy to schedule an appointment,” McAlevey said. “I did it in the beginning of the semester so that may have helped, but I just called and had a counseling appointment in two weeks and then we followed up, so it was not difficult.”

Going forward, Lauderdale aims to continue to provide as many resources as possible for students to meet their mental health needs, according to Halligan-Avery.

“It didn’t feel good for any of us to not see students as quickly as we wanted to,” she said. “It was as painful for us as it was the students that we couldn’t meet with in a timely standard. So, the fact we’ve adjusted our model with the three new therapists has done wonders for our ability to connect with students.”

Genesee Valley Citizens for Peace protests federal military spending

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Members from the Geneseo community protested outside of Congressman Chris Collins’ office on Wednesday April 19 against President Trump’s tax revenue plan. Attendees hope that such action will aid in convicing Collins to listen to his constituents. (Ash Dean/Photo Editor)

Genesee Valley Citizens for Peace arranged a rally outside of Congressman Chris Collins’ office on Wednesday April 19. The goal of the rally was to raise awareness to where tax revenue was distributed.

GVCP member Dr. Arnold Matlin led the rally with associate professor of psychology James Allen. Around 50 people attended the rally, including Geneseo residents and members of the Peace Action Geneseo student organization.  

Attendees held signs that emphasized peace over war and that criticized a proposed increase in military spending by the Trump administration. Organizers passed around a petition that reflected this message. Allen and Matlin both spoke at the event, advocating for tax and budget reform, as well as for action from Collins.

The United States currently uses 53 percent of its discretionary spending to fund the military, which equates to a total of $618.8 billion, according to a press release from GVCP. President Trump plans to increase this figure by an additional $54 billion, according to Allen, which has brought about concerns from GVCP and Peace Action members.

Allen said that he disagrees with this use of tax dollars and that he instead believes that military adventurism has created more problems than solutions for the U.S. Because of this, he would prefer to see the money put to other federal projects, Allen said.

“Trump wants to peel another 54 billion away from social spending,” he said. “With that money, 1.6 million college students could be sent to school for free, or the EPA could be funded for over six and a half years. There’s just so many better ways to spend the money.”

Peace Action Geneseo president junior Uma Natarajan said she believes that protests like this are important in raising public awareness to both tax payers and Collins, the latter who has yet to address the protests. Natarajan said that she hopes that the rallies will continue to evoke positive reactions and will lead to congressional change.

Peace Action Geneseo vice president senior Lilly Perry echoed many of Natarajan’s beliefs. She stressed the importance of convincing Collins and other congressional representatives to reconsider their beliefs.

“Not everyone here is saying they want to abolish the military,” she said. “The problem is just that we spend a lot more than anyone else. The next highest item on the budget is education at 6 percent. It’s absolutely wild.”

The Tax Day rally joins a series of protests in front of Collins’ office that have been held since Trump’s Inauguration. Protests are held weekly by a group called C-27, which refers to Collins being the representative for the 27th district of New York. Both GVCP and C-27 have emphasized the importance of greater communication between Collins and his constituents. 

Geneseo resident Pat Murphy sees value in the protests and hopes that it brings people to think about how their tax dollars are spent and how they are not.    

“We want to show other people out there who are sympathetic that they aren’t alone,” Murphy said. “We want Representative Collins to know that his constituents are really annoyed about what’s going on."

CAS to revamp dining halls, credit card processing system

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Geneseo’s Campus Auxiliary Services will be changing its dining halls and its point of sale system in order to provide a more welcoming and safer environment as well as more efficient customer service to the college community. Red Jacket dining hall will go through significant renovations, which is expected to be completed by Fall 2018. (Ash Dean/Photo Editor)

Campus Auxiliary Services will be implementing a variety of changes over the next few years in the hope of better serving students’ dietary needs at Geneseo.

At the forefront of these changes is the large-scale renovation of the Red Jacket Dining Complex. Executive Director of CAS Mark Scott said that the updated facility will feature a pay-one-price dining option downstairs and a mini mart upstairs, similar to Max Market and Food 

Unlike Letchworth, however, a lounge area will be added to the upstairs area of Red Jacket. The area will provide Southside residents with a location to relax and study, and will feature resources including printers and white boards.

“We found through multiple focus groups and conversations with the Southside community that they really lacked a space of their own,” CAS Marketing Manager Becky Stewart said. “We would like to provide a space that creates a sense of community, as well as better meals and menus that allow for greater satisfaction from students.”

In addition, the renovation will allow for much needed improvements to the structure itself, which had become unsafe for the people that worked there and for student customers, according to Scott. The new building will also be compliant with the Americans with Disabilities Act, with elevators and larger restrooms, including one gender neutral bathroom.

Various students are excited about these upcoming innovations to Southside’s dining options.

“Those are some very cool changes,” childhood and special education major sophomore Kaylan Ruiz said. “It’s nice to know that there will be something nice for the freshmen there.”

Communication major sophomore Josephine Kwan described the old building as dark and uninviting, a sentiment Scott agrees with and hopes to change with the renovation.

“When it opens, Red Jacket Dining Complex will be much brighter, much more inviting and more cohesive,” Stewart said.

Substantial completion is expected to be around spring of 2018, with training occurring over the summer to prep for full service in the fall of 2018.

Following the remodeling of Red Jacket, CAS will look to revamp Books and Bytes. Specific plans are not known at this time, but overarching objectives include improving speed of service, traffic flow and the quality and variety of goods offered.

CAS is also hoping to renew their contract with Starbucks, which ends in four years.

Furthermore, CAS is planning to introduce a new point of sale system that will aim to expedite credit card processing across the restaurants and cafés on campus. The system will also feature a brand-new way for students to access food on campus with mobile ordering.

“We know faculty, students and other stakeholders have limited time to get from class to class and don’t want to spend all this time waiting in line,” Scott said, “So we hope mobile ordering will help speed up lines and make coming into our facility more attractive for people who have limited time for a meal.”

Logistics behind the system—such as capacity issues, pick up locations and items available for pick up—are still being worked out. CAS plans to launch the new system in 2018.

CAS is proud to be able to provide such a large variety of foods to students and that they can employ nearly 400 of those students, Scott said. Furthermore, he affirms that CAS is as committed as ever to raising the bar..

“We don’t settle on our laurels,” Scott said. “We try to do everything we possibly can to do better and be better every day."

Proposal moves forward to College Senate outlining condensed humanities program

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The Committee on Undergraduate Academic Policies, Core and Review approved a proposal that will be sent to the College Senate requiring students to take one humanities course. The resolution would allow students to choose Humanities I or Humanities II. Some students believe such a proposal will prove benefical to students who have a significant amount of degree requirements, while others believe that the humanities program needs to become more diversified. (Jenna Harbus/Staff Photographer)

The Committee on Undergraduate Academic Policies, Core and Review met to discuss a proposal to reduce the required number of humanities courses from two to one on Tuesday March 21.

The proposal was brought forth by the Department of English and is supported by the history department. If passed by the College Senate, this change will allow students to choose between either Humanities I or Humanities II to fulfill their humanities credit, rather than by taking both. 

Associate professor and Chair of the History Department Justin Behrend said that the proposal is an attempt to fix the current problems with the humanities, so that its position as a foundational course may be strengthened. These problems include a lack of lower-classmen, the exclusion of multiple writing assignments, large class sizes and a lack of dedicated full-time professors. Goals of the proposal include an increase in the enrollment of sophomore students in humanities courses, a trained, dedicated group of humanities professors, a reduction in class sizes and a larger focus on writing.

“This is a course that’s supposed to be at the core of the Geneseo liberal arts experience,” Behrend said, “and the majority of the humanities faculty wants to see some changes.”

Student Association President senior Michael Baranowski noted the importance of student exposure to the texts in the humanities courses.

“In my opinion, two of my favorite classes I’ve taken at Geneseo have been Humanities I and II just because the texts are so important to the history of humanities, but it shouldn’t just be limited to Western history,” he said. “I think it would be really awesome if the school was able to offer even one or two courses outside of Western humanities.”

Professor and Chair of the English Department Robert Doggett expressed similar beliefs, seeing the humanities as a course that is greatly beneficial to students of all majors. Doggett believes this is especially true of students early in their college career without a major, as both the texts and the exposure to English, history, philosophy and foreign language would be valuable.

“We don’t want to get rid of this course, we want to improve it, and we think this is the best way to do that,” he said.

Economics and English double major junior Brendan Mahoney said that he believes the current humanities program is too exclusive.

“It might not have been the original intent of the course, but at a college that has ‘inclusivity’ as one of its five main values...it comes off as kind of backwards to spend a whole four hours a week for two semesters learning about how great the people who created our western worldview are,” he said. 

Biology and psychology major senior Sufyan Ahmad suggested diversifying the humanities program to include other cultures outside of the Western world.

“Having subsections would be good idea because some people might be more interested in one particular culture, and I know that a lot of professors specialize in certain parts of the world, so they could teach whatever their specialty is.”

Professor and Chair of the Philosophy Department Theodore Everett opposes the proposal, as he believes that the decision to cut the humanities requirement in half will not necessarily achieve the goals of the proposal. Everett would prefer a more systematic fix, as the problems within the humanities program are not necessarily problems that are exclusive to it.

“This is a big deal,” Everett said. “If it were necessary to cut it in half in order to save the program, then I’d be in favor of that, but I don’t see that its necessary, just one of many possible options.”

Everett was a guest during the meeting and could not vote on this proposal. 

In addition to philosophy, the professors from the Department of Languages and Literatures who teach humanities are against the proposal in its current state. 

The committee vote saw 10 in favor, zero in opposition and one in abstention. The proposal will now go forth to the Senate, where it will be further discussed at a later date.

Associate news editor Malachy Dempsey and news editor Annie Renaud contributed reporting to this article. Managing editor Nicole Sheldon also contributed to the writing of this article.

SUNY increases Sexual Assault and Violence Response resources

SUNY has announced that it will be expanding its Sexual Assault and Violence Response resources across all of its campuses, prompting a positive response from members of the Geneseo community. 

The current initiative will aim to translate the Enough is Enough legislation into more than 100 different languages, to increase the accessibility of resources for international and immigrant students and to offer these resources for free to a college, state agency or community organization.

Director of Student Care Services and Title IX Coordinator for Students Tamara Kenney believes that the expansion will prove an invaluable resource, as it will allow students and families of all backgrounds a single destination to find relevant information on sexual violence and how it is treated, according to a phone interview with Kenney.

Currently, the Title IX Office works with advocacy groups such as RESTORE and Chance for Changes. These provide free, confidential counseling services through the Office of Violence Against Women, as well as connections to on- and off-campus resources. The Title IX Office also sends out a mandatory online training program called the “Think About It Program” to all first year students to raise awareness of sexual assault and alcohol use.

In addition to this, Kenney said that she speaks at first-year student orientation, which is also where peer led awareness programs are held. In addition, members of the Geneseo University Police Department offer a Rape Aggression Defense course in which students, faculty, staff and Geneseo community members learn self-defense and risk assessment skills.

English major junior Hannah Embry sees the expansion of SAVR as a way to make international students more comfortable in getting help and in taking steps toward healing.

“I know that for survivors who are international students that do not speak English as a first language, it is very challenging to get support,” Embry said. “I think that SAVR is an important step in letting them know they have a right to support and resources.”

In regard to how Geneseo currently handles sexual assault, Embry believes that while the support groups on campus are valuable, a larger access to mental health care would be greatly beneficial.

President of Women’s Action Coalition senior Maya Lucyshyn echoed similar beliefs, as she hopes the program will encourage students to speak out.

“As strange as it sounds, I hope reporting rates of sexual assault will increase,” Lucyshyn said. “It looks bad on paper, but that just means that more people are comfortable coming forward and using the resources available to them.”

As far as how Geneseo currently handles sexual assault, Lucyshyn said she would like to see more sexual assault awareness programs for upperclassmen.

“They do a lot of sexual awareness programs for freshmen, but then it kind of ends after freshman orientation,” Lucyshyn said.

Going forward, Kenney, Embry and Lucyshyn all affirm that they wish for the best possible resources and care to be accessible to all students

“We always encourage victims to report so we can provide these services,” Kenney said. “We want to support our victims to getting all the resources they need, so they can continue to be successful at Geneseo.”

Faculty members debate use of trigger warnings in classrooms

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Assistant professor of philosophy and women’s studies Amanda Roth has used trigger warnings in her classeswhen dealing with sensitive material. In her gender and sexualities course (pictured above) Roth provides a trigger warning before delving into discussion on sexual violence. 

The implementation of trigger warnings has become increasingly prevalent over the last few years. Geneseo currently has no policy about the application of these warnings in classroom settings. 

Faculty members are left to determine whether they would like to use trigger warnings, according to Vice President for Student and Campus Life Robert Bonfiglio. Interim Provost and professor of English Paul Schacht said that he believes that Geneseo does not have any specific guidelines due to the various cases that occur when dealing with trigger warnings.

“I don’t know if you could write a policy that would help you figure out how to navigate and negotiate these individual cases,” Schacht said. “What I do know is that the right thing for students and faculty to do is to be open to talking to each other and listening to each other and finding ways to work together that are based on respect, empathy and a recognition of what our shared goals are.”

If a student comes to a faculty member and explains that they are generally uncomfortable with the required course material, Schacht said he believes offering alternative assignments could be problematic.

“Writers, historians and literary writers write about things in order to call attention to them, often in order to make us—the readers—feel like we’re living through that experience,” he said. “So we’d be in a bad place if every time we assigned stuff that made people feel uncomfortable we had to offer an alternative assignment.”

With the decision to enforce trigger warnings left in the hands of the faculty, each take their own approach in administering such warnings. 

Assistant professor of philosophy and women’s studies Amanda Roth said that she believes that in some cases the controversial nature of a course can be self-evident in the titles of the courses themselves, citing courses she has taught on pornography and abortion as examples. Roth also explained that some faculty members may be hesitant to apply such warnings in their classrooms because they could take away from the power of a literary work or a film, but that she does implement them in her own classes out of courtesy for her students. 

“Because I teach women’s studies courses, most of those courses involve some discussion of sexual violence—often a lot of discussion,” Roth said. “What I tend to do is if there’s a particular unit or if there’s a particular book or film, I usually will mention something.”

Adjunct lecturer of philosophy Charles Hertrick said that he believes that a general warning during the introductory class session and a caveat note in the syllabus are sufficient in making students aware of the nature of the course content.

“I do not think it would be possible to avoid all controversial topics with the humanities,” Hertrick said. “I also think part of it is the experience of reading the text directly, confronting the text and wrestling with the text.”

 Professor and Chair of the philosophy department Theodore Everett echoed similar beliefs, explaining that it is the professor’s responsibility to fully explain the content of the course. At the same time, Everett said that his classrooms must be open to free speech.

“If controversial material appears in the course, I expect everyone to take it in the spirit of inquiry, and feel free to argue either way about it, but not expect it to be suppressed,” Everett said.

Faculty believe that students’ reservations and complaints are to be taken seriously with this topic, expressing that they are available to assist them in handling the material.

“It is my job to advocate for the students,” Bonfiglio said. “So if a student came to me and said they wanted a particular warning in a particular class, I would be supportive of them.”

News editor Annie Renaud contributed reporting to this article.