MINDful College Connections (MCC) announced the addition of Butler University as its newest member. MCC was established in 2022 through a grant from Lilly Endowment Inc. and is a shared-resource consortium for student mental health with DePauw University, Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology, and Saint Mary-of-the-Woods College as the founding members.

Curtis Wiseley, Psy.D., executive director of MCC, is excited about the expansion. “We finished the first year fully staffed and operational across our consortium and then began searching for new partners to scale up our services to benefit new member institutions. The objective of MCC has been to show that the consortium model of shared resources works and that we can offer services to other institutions at substantial cost savings. MCC creates a greater efficiency of resources for members, generating savings and allowing institutions to provide expanded mental health services to their students,” explained Wiseley.

Studies have shown a steady increase in the demand for mental health services among college students over the past decade. As the stigma of mental health continues to diminish, a more significant percentage of students have engaged in counseling services in high school and seek to have that support continued into their college experience. Institutions are seeking new and innovative ways to address the increased demand. As prospective students and parents search for colleges, mental health service offerings have become important as a recruiting element and a factor in college student success.

“Student safety and well-being will always be Butler University’s top priority, and joining the MCC consortium will elevate our current mental health support and services in a significant way,” Frank E. Ross, III, vice president for student affairs at Butler University, said. “I’m grateful to Lilly Endowment Inc. for funding this important initiative, and to the founding member institutions for their vision and for allowing Butler University to join the consortium.”

Through the consortium partnership model, MCC can offer member institutions overall cost savings of up to 40% on a package of mental health services and resources, including:

• One full-time clinical counselor for their counseling center provides additional counseling services.
• One full-time mental health and wellness educator for their campus provides educational and prevention programming.
• Mantra Health, a clinically informed telehealth provider for college students, offers additional access to counseling, psychiatric, and 24/7 crisis services.
• Togetherall supports students’ mental health by creating a sense of belonging and connection through an online peer-to-peer support community monitored by licensed clinicians 24/7.
• Nearpeer is a leading technology that helps to improve human flourishing and well-being by supporting greater community, connection, and belonging.
• Titanium Schedule is a fully integrated electronic medical records system designed specifically for use by college and university counseling centers.
• The Center for Collegiate Mental Health at Penn State University is an international practice research network of over 750 colleges and universities dedicated to researching college student mental health. Its mental health database serves as a primary resource for college student mental health.

Wiseley is enthusiastic about the future of MCC and the consortium's ability to offer affordable options for additional student mental health services to other institutions like Butler University. “From the inception of MCC, the objective was to build a model of shared student mental health resources to expand to other institutions. It is so rewarding to see our consortium’s expansion beginning to happen now and to know that more students will be helped with the addition of Butler University,” Wiseley said. 

The Presidents of the founding institutions—DePauw University, Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology, and Saint Mary-of-the-Woods College—have also expressed their excitement about Butler University joining the consortium, seeing it as an essential step in enhancing mental health support for students and expanding the positive impact of MCC’s services.