The Steve Fund is a non-profit organization that promotes the mental health and emotional wellbeing of young people, particularly those from underserved and under-resourced communities. Since its seminal report in 2016, identifying and addressing the unique mental health issues of this student population, the Steve Fund has been helping colleges, universities, and high schools strengthen cultures of belonging and build systems of care that support all students. Their Excellence in Mental Health on Campus framework has been utilized at 66 colleges and universities in 23 states, reaching over 1.1 million students. 

Part of the Steve Fund’s contribution to the field of college student mental health comes from the participation of a national network of Mental Health Experts, one of whom is Dr. Rae Lundy, the chief psychologist and director of counseling at Georgia State University. In this first article in a new content partnership series with the Steve Fund, LearningWell interviews Dr. Lundy about how her growth as a clinician aligns with the changing needs of her Black and Brown students. From her lived experience to her expansive body of work, Dr. Lundy explains why a culturally responsible framework for mental health and wellbeing is critical to helping all students flourish.  

LW: Tell us about your professional journey and how that tracks with the changing needs of students, particularly those from underserved and under-resourced communities? 

RL: I am currently at Georgia State University in Atlanta. We have about 54,000 students on six campuses. I've been in the role of chief psychologist and director of counseling for three years, managing psychiatry and what's called student victim assistance. For me, and for many of my colleagues, this is a calling. I love college students. They're in that developmental space where their identities are emerging, and they are kind of crystallizing who they are. 

I completed my training at the University of Notre Dame, where I studied identity and race, looking at how one's racial identity serves as a buffer against discrimination. That was part of my lived experience, and I took that knowledge into my work. My first role was actually at a counseling center at a large P.W.I. (predominantly white institution), the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. As the only Black psychologist in the counseling center, all Black and Brown students were referred to me, and it was apparent that what I had studied in school, I was seeing in real time in terms of the concerns students were experiencing. On top of anxiety and depression, they were also experiencing issues of belonging and how the intersectionality of their identities impacted their academic functioning. It was a great training ground for this work, so after staying there several years, I went to North Carolina Central University, which was the start of a long stretch of me working at H.B.C.U.s (historically Black colleges and universities).

At North Carolina Central University, I found, like many of my fellow administrators at H.B.C.U.s, that I was carrying like five roles. My students were experiencing distress related to a number of different concerns, including financial concerns. Many of them were first-generation college students,and I felt this overwhelming need to be everything and all things to them. I was working in the counseling center, doing confidential work, but I was also doing a lot of outreach, meeting students where they were. I was an advisor for a student group. And in doing all of those things, it felt like there was this need to support mental health in a way that the institutions at the time didn't understand. It was about stigma, which is looked at very differently today. 

The main thing we were doing is to try to get folks to have conversations about mental health. I was doing confidential one-on-one individual counseling, but really what I discovered was that expressive therapies and unique ways of reaching students were a better way of getting them to process and be open to having deeper conversations about how they were feeling. I had some tremendous success with that. We had an increase of students coming to the center. We did what we called interpersonal process groups: So maybe they didn’t want to talk about a specific thing, but they knew they needed and wanted to be around someone like my colleagues and me. 

It got me thinking about this idea I now lean into called C.R.I. — compassion, reflection, and intention. I began to share with folks that it's okay to acknowledge and be compassionate towards yourself. We're all compassionate towards our friends. Why would you not give yourself the same attention? This idea of C.R.I. was a way for me to have mental health in all spaces. Oftentimes, in the mental health field, we are going to our therapist location, or now we're meeting virtually. For many college students, we need to bring down this barrier around the conversation, which is what I was really passionate and excited about. 

LW: Why was this engagement work particularly important for students, particularly those from underserved and under-resourced communities?  

RL: There is research to support that help-seeking behaviors of students, particularly those from underserved and under-resourced communities, are often psychologically and negatively reinforced. There is a sense that one might be punished for asking for help — or that it is a sign of weakness. For Black and Brown communities, asking for help can reinforce the idea that you're not as smart as others. Did you really get here on your own? One might see why it would be more challenging to ask for support.

"For those from underserved and under-resourced communities, there is a sense that one might be punished for asking for help — or that it is a sign of weakness."

Or if you think about it, if a student is a first-generation college student, if most in their family havenever had this experience before, who do they ask for help from? That’s true of all support in college. If you're a first-generation college student and you're asking about what you need to do to register for classes or find additional funding, but your parents and your grandparents have never done that, that becomes a barrier and a burden that they might internalize as something they have to handle on their own, while not really knowing what resources to turn to. That is why organizations like the Steve Fund are actively seeking to present themselves as resources for these students. 

When you talk about belonging and identity, so much of that is connected to performance, self-care, and wellness, but in some communities, you haven't been given permission to take care of yourself because your identity is wrapped up in how much you're doing for others. What emotional wellbeingand mental health ask of us is to be introspective, to connect, and to see what is going on internally within ourselves. Many times, Black and Brown students either haven't been given that space, or we haven't held space for them to do that. Another issue is exceptionalism, this idea that you're articulate — for a Black or Brown person — or you're smart — for a Black or Brown person. And that’s a lot to carry. 

Some of the most prevalent challenges you see are around anxiety. And that's true of college students in general. But anxiety and depression manifest differently for Black and Brown students. Oftentimes, it presents as an irritable mood or what could be misinterpreted as the angry Black or Brown person. My recommendation has been for folks to ensure that we are being culturally responsive and informed as we are doing this work so that we have a good sense of: How does this particular mental health outcome manifest or look differently in varying settings? And then if we think about the concept of privilege, who gets to have emotional responses? Who gets to be expressive?  And if we think about your earlier question, you asked whether it's okay for me to ask for help; if it's not, then it's probably not okay for me to appear sad. It's probably not okay for me to appear uncomfortable.

LW: I can imagine that all of this experience was useful when you actually created a college counseling center from scratch, correct? 

RL: Yes. I was approached by the president of a smaller H.B.C.U. — Wiley College at the time, now Wiley University — in Marshall, Texas. They didn't have a counseling center or any substantive mental health services for their students. After visiting the institution, I fell in love with the campus, with the students, and I thought, “No student should go without mental health support.” I soon discovered that Wiley was not unique. It was like many smaller institutions that just didn't have funding. In years past, institutions may have thought they had the option of not investing in mental health. This was before universities realized that mental health is directly connected to retention. For smaller schools, retention is directly related to keeping the doors open.   

Once the link between retention and mental health was established, we were able to have open conversations around mental health, acknowledging that it’s not an afterthought or a second, third, or fourth priority when you're thinking about academic success. If a student is not emotionally well, they can't show up and be present in class. With that in mind, I was able to advocate for the students. I was initially a counseling center of one, and then we grew to be a fully functioning center. When I left, we had three additional staff, a training program, and a broad range of services.  

I eventually brought the knowledge gained from Wiley with me to Georgia State. I moved here for personal reasons, to become a caregiver to my elderly father. It was so interesting to end up here,which is his alma mater. 

LW: What have you found to be some of the most effective strategies to deal with the unique mental health challenges of Black and Brown students? 

NL: I believe leaning into forms of therapy and support outside of one-to-one individual counseling is particularly effective — things like group counseling, outreach experiences, ambassadorships, and opportunities for connection in what we call third spaces. We are creating other spaces outside of the classroom, outside of one's home, that become brave and safe spaces for people to simply be and discover themselves. 

Group counseling demystifies, or challenges, the idea that I'm alone in experiencing things. Also, Black and Brown students have historically come from what we would consider collectivist cultures; these are backgrounds where you might have two or three generations living in a home. And so this idea around mental health is not just one-to-one individual counseling but also group counseling, some of which reinforces what has felt safe and healing and connecting for them in spaces that were safe,healing, and connecting before they got to college or university.

"I believe leaning into forms of therapy and support outside of one-to-one individual counseling is particularly effective."

And then we think of expressive therapies. Movement is a beautiful way to release emotions and connect to oneself. In expressive spaces, the emphasis is not just on what clients are verbally saying but also how they are emoting. We look at somatic interventions, which really connect to the body, which again connect back to this idea of cultures where many Black and Brown communities use movement as a way to express themselves. 

I think a lot about meeting students and clients where they are. They may not be ready for traditional forms of treatment, but they are often on TikTok. Some of that information isn't always accurate, but what if we have licensed, competent individuals who share it and can provide meaningful content onwellness strategies and wellbeing interventions? When this happens, students have agency to take in information in ways that are digestible for them. It’s true we have standardized, evidence-based treatments and a certain language within the mental health field, but by not engaging on platforms like TikTok, we miss a subset of the population in need of care, and often that population includes our Black and Brown students.

LW: That brings me to my next question. You are about to launch a new passion project, which is an app developed specifically for individuals of color. What is that all about?  

It's called Amelia Sage, a wellbeing app for women of color. Amelia Sage combines artificial intelligence with the oversight of licensed clinicians. There will be wellness plans and daily interactions for participants to experience. And the app's goal is to promote flourishing. I've been in the weeds recently, defining what it means to be well and recognizing that wellness is not without itschallenges. The work is grounded heavily in the dimensions of wellness. We look at social, intellectual, financial, and all areas of wellbeing; and within that framework, we promote whole wellbeing. We are currently finalizing details for a 14-day mental health wellness plan, and a primary goal is to share it with college students.  

All of this connects back to what the Steve Fund does by putting information and resources readily available at students’ fingertips. For good, bad, right, wrong, or indifferent — everything is at their fingertips. And so we want to make sure that what they are engaging with and really internalizing is information that's going to help them be well and flourish.

You can reach LearningWell Editor Marjorie Malpiede at mmalpiede@learningwellmag.org with comments, ideas, or tips.