Episode 56: Scared of School with Baylor CARE Team Director Meghan Becker, Part One

00;00;09;00 – 00;00;55;17
Rick Hoaglund
Welcome to OnTopic by Empathia, where today we’ll explore a team working behind the scenes to support student success, health and wellbeing. In this two part series, we’re deep diving into the Care Team at Baylor University, a group dedicated to providing critical support for students facing challenges. Whether it’s academic, emotional, or physical well-being, the Care Team ensures students seeking support are provided available resources. Join us as we uncover what makes this team so essential to the Baylor community and how they’re making a real difference. We’re joined by Meghan Becker, the Director of Sudent Care and Wellbeing at Baylor University, and she leads the Care Team. Meghan, thanks very much for joining us on our podcast today!

00;00;55;18 – 00;00;56;29
Meghan Becker
Yeah, happy to be here!

00;00;57;00 – 00;01;09;23
Rick Hoaglund
And, Megan, you run a very special group at Baylor University that is totally designed for the benefit of students and please, please correct me if I’m wrong, but it’s called The Care Team, right?

00;01;09;26 – 00;01;11;29
Meghan Becker
Yeah, Care Team Services, yes!

00;01;12;01 – 00;01;16;00
Rick Hoaglund
So tell me what that is. What exactly is your group?

00;01;16;03 – 00;01;57;14
Meghan Becker
Yeah! So Care Team Services is a group of case managers here on campus who really, you know, kind of our elevator speech is that we work with students who are struggling or having a hard time. We’re a team of case managers who work with students who are struggling to- and we work to connect them to resources. And I say we work with students who are dealing with anxiety, depression, relationship issues, financial issues, academic concerns, suicidal ideation, and anything and everything in between. And our primary goal is to make a connection with the student, but then to, connect them to resources that are available to them on campus.

00;01;57;17 – 00;02;12;24
Rick Hoaglund
So do you find that there are certain sort of, triggers for people like, like, for instance, do you find that when things are in the news maybe that can trigger or are you seeing kind of a steady all the time?

00;02;12;27 – 00;02;38;22
Meghan Becker
Yeah, we do see a bit of an escalation when things are in the news, but it’s really not that, you know? I mean, it’s really, more just all the time. And I will say this semester in particular, we have had our numbers have been higher in October, even higher? Now, you know, some could say that people are escalating a bit because of the election and just that feel in the country in general, just the pulse.

00;02;38;22 – 00;02;50;03
Meghan Becker
But, overall, October shows higher numbers. And our numbers all year have just been drastically increasing. So- so not necessarily!

00;02;50;05 – 00;02;53;24
Rick Hoaglund
What about the holidays? Does that bring a spike?

00;02;53;26 – 00;03;39;21
Meghan Becker
Yes! The holidays brings a bit of a spike, more after than before? You know, really what- what happens is students, I think might have, like, a naive way of thinking how the holiday is going to go and then, it doesn’t go that way. So they’ll come afterwards. Or another thing that happens is that students haven’t been honest with their families about, you know, what- what they’re struggling with or their grades or things like that. And so then they go and they try and talk to them, and that just lends itself to harder conversations. And so, yes, we do see, you know, after, Thanksgiving, Christmas, spring break, Easter, we do see an increase, not drastic, but a bit of an increase. Yes.

00;03;39;23 – 00;04;00;09
Rick Hoaglund
So do you think that, is this unique to a student population? Like, do they have unique needs and things that you’re meeting as well? I mean, these are normally, I’m guessing people that are 18 through early 20s, I’m guessing. I mean, you have older students. You probably have younger students too. But I would think most of our population- go ahead!

00;04;00;11 – 00;04;40;15
Meghan Becker
I’m sorry, yeah! Here at Baylor, we’re we have 14,000 undergraduate students. And I would say that’s more like the traditional college student age, 18 to 22. We have 6000 grad students, which is a pretty dense grad population. And I would say those are about, 22, 23 to 30? But we have an increasing number of online graduate programs. And so those tend to lend themselves to older students. But not, I would say, not in droves or anything. So we work with students, I would say mainly 18 to 30.

00;04;40;18 – 00;04;53;26
Rick Hoaglund
So does your group, use tools other than just in-person? I know you use some in-person, tools, but do you use online tools? Do you use to reach to reach out to students that are struggling?

00;04;53;29 – 00;05;58;10
Meghan Becker
Yeah. So yes, we definitely want- our outreach is all via email and text. So if we get a referral that a student is struggling, we- we email them and then we email them twice. And then if they don’t respond, we text them, we meet with them in person. But we do offer to meet with them via Zoom. So, this semester, I know we’ve met with folks in Oregon, Washington, Houston, Dallas, so we do offer to meet with them in Zoom. And then our resources are typically in person. But we do have the counseling center offers virtual therapy as well as we have a partnership with a company called Academic Life Care. And they offer virtual health care visits, primary care psychiatry and nutrition. So, our- our services are both online and virtual for care team services. But two of our big resources that counseling center and the health center also offer virtual offerings.

00;05;58;13 – 00;06;05;13
Rick Hoaglund
So you’re offering this to students that are on campus, off campus, and those virtual learners as well, I’m guessing?

00;06;05;18 – 00;06;10;02
Meghan Becker
Yes! Mm-hmm! Yeah, we serve about 20,000 students.

00;06;10;05 – 00;06;24;03
Rick Hoaglund
What are the trends that you’re seeing? Like what are you seeing that students that are, you know, like you said, 18 to 22 and then your grad students are older and that’s a significant portion of your population! But what- what is it that they’re struggling with? What- what are you seeing?

00;06;24;05 – 00;07;40;13
Meghan Becker
Yeah, first and foremost for sure, anxiety. Anxiety and stress is our highest referral reason. And then depression would be our second. We used to have those combined, when tracking referrals. But now we have them separated and anxiety is definitely higher. And then depression. And then honestly, academic concerns, you know, coming out of, the pandemic and COVID, students have really struggled with academic fortitude and stick-to-it-ive-ness? I know that’s not really a word, but, academics has been difficult for students. And then our last one, that we see often is, death of a, a family friend, a family member or a friend. We have just seen a drastic increase in students experiencing death of a family member or a close friend. So, and then our fourth one that we’ve seen an increase in, this isn’t one of our top four referrals, but one, thing that we’ve noticed is, eating disorders and disordered eating? Students who are struggling with that is- those numbers are definitely higher.

00;07;40;16 – 00;07;55;12
Rick Hoaglund
Are these students that are reaching out about themselves, or do you also take in- I will call them referrals, but referrals from, friends, family? Yeah! How do you- how do you find out about these- these students?

00;07;55;14 – 00;09;55;27
Meghan Becker
Yeah! So we have, a several ways for folks to find out. So we’ve done a lot of advertising, on campus. And then we actually have a folder, that we hand out to students. I was going to show you, but that wouldn’t matter on a podcast. But, that’s a folder that gives all sorts of information about, you know, here’s what- here’s who to call if you have these situations. And so, that is where how will they find out where to refer or who to refer. We do trainings and, student organizations classes, faculty meetings, new faculty meeting, different things like that. And so, they can refer students to us through a link to on our website and it’s called the report-it link? And they just click on that and go to the Care Team. And then that, that will allow them to report a student. You can also call our office and/or send an email. And students are able to just walk in. So those are the different ways we can get referrals. But honestly, last year, our highest referral resource, the people who referred the most people was students themselves, either students self-reporting or students reporting friends, which we were glad and surprised by, just that students are advocating for themselves and their need for help. And the second referral source, highest referral source for us is actually housing. The folks who work in campus living and learning the residential environment, is the highest, second, highest. And then, some other really strong ones are definitely parents and, parents as well as the counseling center. We have a really strong partnership with the counseling center and see students- you know, we send lots of students to them and they send lots of students to us.

00;09;55;29 – 00;10;11;01
Rick Hoaglund
So do you have- is there a stigma around this? I mean, as a student? And it might even depend on sort of what I’m studying, where I live, my background. But is there a stigma about reaching out and saying, hey, I have a problem?

00;10;11;03 – 00;10;48;26
Meghan Becker
Yeah, that’s a great question. You know, we find that students, there’s less stigma around students reaching out to us as Care Team Services because we are case managers and not necessarily mental health professionals. I think sometimes they’re more comfortable reaching out to us than they are to say, title nine or, the counseling center or even psychiatry because we’re, you know, quote unquote, not mental health professionals. It’s like, oh, that’s just Care Team! And so we see less stigma and able to make more of a connection there.

00;10;48;29 – 00;10;52;20
Rick Hoaglund
I would guess that, their information is confidential.

00;10;52;22 – 00;11;20;25
Meghan Becker
It’s confidential. I’m going to go back to the stigma question. Sure! I will say one thing about this generation is that in general, there is much less stigma around anything having to do with mental health. This generation are very comfortable talking about their diagnoses, their medication, things that they are dealing with than definitely generations prior. And then your second question-

00;11;20;25 – 00;11;22;09
Rick Hoaglund
That’s okay! On confidentiality-

00;11;22;11 – 00;12;48;13
Meghan Becker
Confidentiality! Okay, so we are not- we are not a HIPAA compliant office. So we’re not covered under HIPAA. And so we say that we are mandatory reporters who are a non-confidential resource, meaning if someone shares something about themselves being a harm to themselves or others, or if they were involved in a title nine situation, we are mandatory reporters and have to report that, but other things, you know, like the choices that they made on the weekend or, you know, things that they said to their parents or what- none of that is, we don’t have any obligation to share that. We are protected under FERPA, which is a law around higher education and gives students who are 18 and older the freedom to be protected against- so parents can’t get, you know, they- they can’t get our records, or if a parent calls us and says, can my student- can you tell me if my student met with you? They’re- they’re protected under FERPA. A lot of times because we work with students in crisis, there is a FERPA exception, which is if there’s an emergency situation, then we can call family. So if a student is, suicidal and not doing well or, you know, on their way to the hospital, we’re able to call because of the emergency exception, the FERPA.

00;12;48;16 – 00;12;55;29
Rick Hoaglund
Tell me a little bit about the background of the Care Team. How- do you know, by any chance, how long it’s been going on and why it was established?

00;12;56;01 – 00;14;33;28
Meghan Becker
Yeah, yeah. So, Care Teams and case management, higher education and institutions of higher education, actually started because of the Virginia Tech shooting? So in 2007, when the Virginia Tech shooting happened, colleges and universities across the nation, began to realize they needed to pay attention. Because that student was on several people’s radar. He was on the Housing Department’s radar, the English department’s radar, and, student activities, but nobody was communicating. And so case management actually was born out of that. So there’s an there’s a, organization called Higher Education and Case Management Association, started by some folks at Virginia Tech. And it has grown and blossomed into, what our Care Teams are and so, the one at Baylor started, so we only had one senior case manager, from about 2012 to 2017, there was one, and then in 2017, they created two more positions for case management. And so in 2017 is when I started and as the senior case manager, and there were two case managers under- under me. And from 2017 to 2019, we were just three case managers who were kind of out there flopping. And then in 2019, we officially that we officially became like a department or an area Care Team service.

00;14;34;01 – 00;14;53;16
Rick Hoaglund
So this is something that’s supported by your, your university. How do you maintain that support? Because I could see it being rah rah-rah-rah, and then if you aren’t careful, it suddenly becomes just another part of the university. How do you- how do you keep your excitement going within your team as well as the leadership above you?

00;14;53;18 – 00;18;09;06
Meghan Becker
Yeah! I’ll answer about the leadership above me first and then within the team. So, I will say I have a supervisor who is an incredible support to us. Dr. Jim Marsh, is an incredible support to us as Care Team Services. He’s a Psychologist by trade and worked in the Baylor Counseling Center for 25 years. He’s transitioned into being a Dean of Student Health and Wellness, but he understands, what we do because I am continuously telling our story. I’m telling him, you know, our numbers, the situations, you know, not only have our numbers increased this year, but the complexity of the situations that are coming our way have increased, including psychoses, threat to others, you know, just different, different situations that are a little more complicated. And so because of that, I’m just constantly telling him, telling him our story. He receives that and then gives it to the vice president, who then reports that up to the president, I will I will say, the- the leadership, the senior leadership and administration is extremely supportive of what we do and sees value in the work that we do. And so kind of to your point about, how do I keep the enthusiasm of the team? I think that’s a different question. Then, you know, then the- the senior administration. But I will say we have a very strong team. There’s a team of, four case managers who do all of this work, which is, you know, we had 42 referrals last Thursday. So if you think about that, that’s ten referrals in a day. So we- we get- we’re averaging in October about 115 a week. But then we ended up with about 600 referrals just in October. So but what I will say is, I really do a lot of encouraging, we also really enjoy each other and enjoy spending time together. I make sure that we laugh together and do things outside of work because it can be really strenuous, just the work that we do. One other thing that, I do is I allow everybody to work from home one day a week. And that’s because when you walk into this office, if you work with students in crisis, it’s kind of like the ER, right? Like you never know what’s going to come. So the adrenaline is just at a higher rate already. So allowing people to work from home to get their notes done, meet with students virtually just- just allows that, adrenaline to not be at its peak every single day all day. So, yeah! And then I can tell, like last week, that the person- the assistant director for Care Team Services had had a really hard day, two student crises and, the 42 referrals? And she just said, hey, S.O.S., I need to take the day off tomorrow. And I said, that’s great! I sent a text making sure everybody knew not to contact her. And, and, you know, so we do and my supervisors the same with me. And we do tend to really take care good care of each other as this work is, it’s just not easy.

00;18;09;08 – 00;18;29;24
Rick Hoaglund
How do you… this is- and this isn’t meant to be at all critical, but how do you- how do you know when you’ve had success? Like, how do you justify that to those that might be in accounting or, or in more, administrative positions where they’re looking at budgets or looking at finance? How do you- how do you justify your group?

00;18;29;27 – 00;19;49;14
Meghan Becker
Yeah, I that’s interesting that you say that! I, I think that’s a good question because, and I was thinking about it when I was reviewing over the questions, you know, what do people care about at institutions of higher education? It’s retention, right? And so, I will say we don’t run our numbers as far as retention goes, but- but I think, you know, this next year we probably will. But honestly, because we are so well respected on campus, I mean, the president’s office calls us, the vice president’s office calls us, the deans call us because we are so well respected and we continuously tell our story, in a way that people know that we are doing good work for students. There’s a lot of trust in that, and not a lot of need for keep us around, keep us around everywhere. We- our reputation precedes us! I don’t know how else to say that. But I do think that we- part of the reality is we just are so understaffed to do any sort of analytics or programs around, retention rates and things like that. We just don’t have the capacity for that.

00;19;49;17 – 00;20;26;23
Rick Hoaglund
I like what you said when you said, what do people think that a university is meant for? Like it’s definitely education. And then if you work in that field, it’s definitely retention and and ensuring that your endowments are good and all that stuff. But I guess my question is, is it expected now on a university campus for you to take care of a students not only academic- academically, but also their physical and their mental health? Is that sort of an expected thing by parents or even by students when they come to school there?

00;20;26;25 – 00;20;29;10
Meghan Becker
Well, isn’t that a lighthearted question, Rick?

00;20;29;29 – 00;20;30;13
Rick Hoaglund
I know, I know! I’m sorry!

00;20;30;13 – 00;22;56;28
Meghan Becker
You know, we do talk about that often because sometimes I think the expectations that parents and students have are a bit outside of our scope of care? But, you know, we are a private institution, a private Christian institution where it costs, a good amount of money to come here. And so I think with that comes a lot of expectation. And so we try to be careful about our messaging around, you know, what we will do to care for students and what we will do to care for their needs, but also with some boundaries. You know, sometimes we feel as if parents have been dealing with this for 18 years and they’re like, oh my goodness, you know, best wishes, you know? And then we get the student in there and really in pretty significant health crisis that, have a lot of needs and, we just it’s beyond our scope. So I think you, you bring a good question. The answer is yes. I think, you know, we had a situation last week where our- ooh, or two weeks ago, where student was really, really struggling, and had been struggling. And the parents let us know about that. And, we had connected the student to all the resources. He was connected to the Baylor Counseling Center, to psychiatry. And then he began to deteriorate mental health wise. And, we called the parents and the mom, called the case manager and yelled at her for 30 minutes because she was like, I’ve told y’all what was going on. Baylor has failed my son. But our the reality is we knew he was struggling because we had surrounded him with such great care. But there’s so much stress, financial stress, emotional stress, mental health, stress for the parent that in that situation, it was clear that the mom wasn’t thinking clearly because she was so stressed out when really, the person who had helped her son almost the most was getting the brunt of the mom’s stress. So, I mean, and that’s not every situation, but we do have some parents who just have really high expectations of- of us.

00;22;57;00 – 00;23;20;15
Rick Hoaglund
So I know that you have confidentiality issues and we’ve already kind of talked about those, but is this sometimes I know it’s not always, but is this sometimes a combination of, where you, you are working with the family or working with the friends or the social network of this individual as part of your case management?

00;23;20;18 – 00;23;41;04
Meghan Becker
Oh, oh, yes, for sure! Yeah! It’s very, I would say probably 75% of the time we are working with a student support system, in addition to the student, especially students who are in crisis.

00;23;41;06 – 00;24;15;18
Rick Hoaglund
Can this model – because I think this is a model that is somewhat unique to education, I’m just being honest and maybe some very large corporations, but I don’t even can’t even think of top of my head of any that have it – is this a model that can be adopted outside of the university arena? So talking about people that are potentially older, or at least they’re not in school anymore, that that may not have the expectation that their- their employers should offer this! But is it something that a company could do?

00;24;15;21 – 00;26;02;24
Meghan Becker
Yes! I think, you know, I think a company doing that is really different than an educational system, right? And we do have HR, you know, our HR department has cared for faculty and staff who who might be struggling. But if you think about peer to peer or even boss to employee and then you’re talking about someone’s mental health, they’re just it gets real mucky and messy because then you were, you know, you have the ADA laws and you worry about discrimination. So I don’t- I don’t know how… I would have to think through how that would work in a company setting necessarily, because then you have colleagues, and who would- who would lead the Care Team? Would you hire social workers just to do that? You know, just I think you’d have to ask some really delicate questions while also letting employees know there’s going to be people who could know about them and their struggles. Ooh, that that feels a little bit messy to me. But there are some situations, you know, I think that k through 12, k 12 models could really use this idea. And having, you know, a care team at each school, if you had a social worker, at each school, you can have that, you can have them talking about students that they’re concerned about or concerned about their behavior, and the things that they’re dealing with. And a lot of schools do have that! They just don’t necessarily call it a Care Team. So I think the model is transferable. But it would just come from- at higher-ended companies, it feels a little bit tricky to me.

00;26;02;26 – 00;26;41;24
Rick Hoaglund
I could see it maybe applying more to like, a hospital setting. If you’re going to go. Oh, yeah, or a nonprofit maybe, that’s helping people that are in need having- having this, then I can see, most other organizations maybe out there. Thank you for joining us! If you’re part of the Baylor community or know someone who might benefit from these resources at Baylor, reach out to the Care Team! They’re here to help! To hear other episodes of OnTopic with Empathia, visit our website, www.empathia.com. Follow us on social media @Empathia, and subscribe to OnTopic with Empathia to hear new episodes as soon as they go live.