Miami strengthened student mental health care by providing advanced training for clinicians in trauma-informed care, OCD treatment, and group therapy, ensuring students receive more specialized, evidence-based support through the Student Counseling Service.

The Student Counseling Service (SCS) now offers equine-assisted psychotherapy and drop-in outreach programming in partnership with the Equestrian Center, expanding students’ access to innovative, evidence-informed approaches to mental health support.

Miami recently expanded student access to counseling through the online therapy platform BetterMynd, which connects students with licensed clinicians for individual teletherapy sessions. BetterMynd extends access to care during evenings, weekends, and academic breaks when the Student Counseling Service is closed, and allows students studying out of state to continue therapy remotely.

With funding from the Ohio Department of Higher Education, Miami expanded student mental health support by launching MUHOPE, a free 24/7 crisis text line that gives students immediate, accessible support anytime they need it.

The university’s Focus theme for the 2025–26 academic year is health and wellness, creating a coordinated opportunity for collaboration between academic programming and the Mental Health Committee. Together, these efforts elevate shared initiatives, reinforce campus-wide wellbeing priorities, and promote synchrony across events, curricula, and co-curricular programming.

Students can now schedule their first in-person counseling appointment online. Previously, first appointments needed to be made over the phone or in person. The online scheduling option is for initial consultations only. After the first appointment, students will schedule their next meetings at the end of each appointment.

The new website, wellbeing.MiamiOH.edu, features a search and filter function that serves as a repository of all mental health and well-being resources, wellness navigators for faculty, staff, and students, and news and events related to mental health and well-being.

The Office of the Dean of Students expanded access to the student of concern form to both students and community members in 2023-24. The form is a simple outlet to identify and support Miami students who are struggling with mental health, financial challenges, etc. Students can also use the form to self-identify a concern. Submitted concerns are routed through the CARE Team, where the appropriate outreach office is identified and dispatched.

Student Counseling Service (SC), in collaboration with the Office of Student Wellness and the HRSA Grant Consortium, has established two rooms in SCS designated for students to use for telebehavioral health appointments. This is particularly helpful for students who have roommates.

WellTrack Boost is now offered to students on all campuses. Welltrack Boost is a self-guided, clinically supported, CBT-based set of tools that help individuals assess, understand, and work on their own behavioral health and wellness. The app is part of the strategy to increase access for student care in more informal ways than individual therapy.

Miami University hosted a mental health incubator fund to support student mental health programming on campus in spring 2024. The fund, supported by the Ohio Department of Higher Education (ODHE),  was created to inspire members of the Miami community to develop new initiatives that will enhance mental health support for students across all of Miami’s campuses. In its first year, the fund awarded over $90,000 across 27 different projects. It will return for the 2024-25 year.

The Miami Mental Health Committee was established in response to Miami’s Institutional Task Force on Student, Faculty, and Staff Mental Health and Emotional Well-Being. The committee has been actively engaged since the 2022-23 academic year in spearheading, advancing, and elevating institutional efforts around mental health and emotional well-being.

Oxford Student Counseling Services and Regionals Student Counseling Services began collaborating on data collection methods to better serve students on all campuses.  All campuses are implementing online scheduling and are exploring better ways to facilitate student care as our students transition to different campuses. 

The Office of Student Wellness expanded internship opportunities for undergraduate social work students. Supervised by the assistant director for mental health promotion, social work interns commit to a one-year placement in OSW and receive a $1,500 stipend. These positions provide coordinators for the Wellness Studio on both Oxford and Hamilton campuses and organization for university mental health initiatives, as well as assistance and programming for community mental health efforts.

The Office of Student Wellness hired 15 new student peer educators who are dedicated to mental health education, including coping skills, mindfulness, and Question, Persuade, Refer (QPR) Suicide Prevention Training. The Mental Health Peer Educators also staff the Wellness Studio, providing resources and support to students in the space.

The Office of Parent and Family Programs, in collaboration with the Office of Student Wellness and Student Counseling Service created videos to help parents whose students are struggling with their mental health. The videos provide practical tips and conversation prompts for parents and families to engage with students around mental health topics.