Amidst the current staff shortage at the Oakland University Counseling Center, the need for quality, timely student support grows each day. To mitigate service wait times, the OUCC has created several support groups centered around various mental health topics. These support groups are available free of charge to Oakland University students for the winter semester.
Dr. Travis Goldwire, a clinical psychologist skilled in cognitive behavioral therapy, is the group coordinator for the OUCC support groups. Goldwire offers six support group sessions at the Oakland Center each week.
On Tuesdays and Wednesdays, the OUCC offers social anxiety support groups.
“The most widely attended ones are our social anxiety support groups, we call those ‘Adulting 101,’” Goldwire said. “It’s about helping students to go out to meet people and to interact with their peers and to overcome some of the anxiety that typically keeps students from connecting with others.”
While each support group focuses on a specific topic, Goldwire is flexible when it comes to topics not found on the itinerary. Students are free to bring up topics they would like to talk about, even if they do not pertain directly to the group’s discussion topic.
“I try to repeat some of these subjects because I know sometimes students can’t attend or they missed them,” Goldwire said. “If students have an interest in something that maybe isn’t on the schedule but they just wanted to come, I’m very flexible and if there aren’t many students there, I’ll say yeah let’s talk about whatever you want to talk about.”
In the past, OUCC has used a program known as the stepped care model. Under this model, the counseling center offers an array of mental health support services, other than individual therapy, to ensure that students get the help they need.
The OUCC suggests that students looking to start individual therapy try attending a group therapy session first. Once the spaces clear for individual therapy, the counseling center then assigns those students to individual therapists.
The support groups have been helpful in alleviating some of the pressure off of the OUCC therapists as their caseloads rise throughout the school year.
“It sort of gives us some breathing room,” Goldwire said. “With any counseling center, there’s only so many therapists to go around, and the ratio of students to counselors at Oakland is not the best. The groups really do provide an opportunity for students to be able to learn self-help, and learn about things that they can do to help themselves that are outside of an individual therapy dynamic.”
While each session is first come first serve due to the size of space available, every session is free of charge. While students can simply walk into a session, registering online is preferred to help the OUCC understand what help you are looking for.
For students interested in learning more about the OUCC support groups, please visit the center’s OU webpage. For questions about the services provided by the OUCC, or those looking to speak with Goldwire, please contact him at his email address, [email protected].
