Enhancing a Culture of Care - The University of Northern Iowa (UNI) is a four year public university, founded in 1876 and located in Cedar Falls, Iowa. The university serves 9,231 students from Iowa, other states, and several countries. UNI is seeking funding to implement the Enhancing the Culture of Care project at UNI. The project is aimed at suicide prevention, enhanced substance abuse services, and improved mental health care especially to underserved and marginalized populations on campus. To achieve these purposes, UNI proposes to: 1) Enhance suicide prevention education, outreach, and training, and build a mental health ally network and infrastructure among students, faculty, and staff by hiring a health and wellness coordinator who will help collaborate with front line departments to train them on suicide prevention, substance abuse prevention, and mental health awareness. We will broadly distribute resources and hold train the trainer sessions so that front line departments can continue this work after the project ends; 2) Enhance substance abuse services by administering the services to reduce overall risk to students by contracting with a substance abuse counselor to administer services at no cost to students while also distributing resources to increase awareness of substance use issues among students and staff; and 3) Develop and implement culturally competent group programming to support the mental health of students impacted by mental health issues with a particular focus on marginalized populations by launching groups to provide psychological education, encouragement, connection, and support to at risk and marginalized populations. We will partner with the Office of Diversity, Inclusion, and Social Justice to train additional staff to assist us in our efforts. Additionally, we will improve the overall cultural competency in our Student Health Center with annual training at a minimum. This capacity building and outreach effort will help enhance the culture of care and reduce risk factors for students. This project fits very well with the university's strategic plan goals of: 1) diversity & inclusion, 2) campus vitality, 3) community engagement, 4) student health and wellness. We hope to serve, at minimum, 3,000 students, and at minimum provide suicide prevention, mental health and substance abuse training to 300 or more faculty and/or staff annually for a total of 3,300 people served.
