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Mental Health and Counselling
Mental health services at the Student Wellness Centre include assessment, diagnosis, and treatment, using short-term, goal-directed counselling, crisis intervention, and crisis management.
Common concerns addressed in short-term therapy include anxiety and depression; homesickness; stress management; roommate tensions; parental and family conflict; surviving a break-up; grief; and confidence and self-esteem.
At this time, most students chose in-person counselling appointments, but video and telephone appointments are also available.
Steps to Well-Being
The Student Wellness Centre uses the Stepped Care Model to help you monitor your mental health and well-being. Consult our steps to well-being resource to learn about how you can take care of you.
Our counselling team includes registered social workers and psychotherapists who use a short-term, goal-directed model of care serving all registered Laurier students. Our team includes a diverse group of professionals who use a variety of therapeutic modalities to support students' needs. All members of the counselling team are committed to collaborative, client-centred care within a safe therapeutic environment. The Student Wellness Centre recognizes and supports the richness of human diversity and reflects the values of cultural, ethnic, gender, and sexual orientation differences through anti-racist, anti-oppressive, and trauma-informed practice.
Some members of the counselling team have special roles that serve specific student populations. On the Waterloo campus, we have a Residence Life counsellor who supports first year students living in residence. On both the Brantford and Waterloo campuses, and a counsellor who serves Indigenous students. Let us know if you would like to see one of these counsellors when you call to book your appointment. To schedule an appointment with the multi-campus Indigenous counsellor, Margaret Neveau, visit the Indigenous Students Support page.
Some members of the counselling team have special roles that serve specific student populations. On the Waterloo campus, we have a Residence Life counsellor who supports first year students living in residence. On both the Brantford and Waterloo campuses, and a counsellor who serves Indigenous students. Let us know if you would like to see one of these counsellors when you call to book your appointment. To schedule an appointment with the multi-campus Indigenous counsellor, Margaret Neveau, visit the Indigenous Students Support page.
Some services are outside our scope of practice, extend beyond our scope of care, or require very specialized providers. Examples may include:
- Students who are already receiving ongoing therapy with another mental health provider.
- Students who cannot be stabilized with short-term crisis intervention; or who consistently need service more than once per week and/or frequent require consultation after-hours
- Students who require intensive outpatient or inpatient treatment (for example, impairing eating disorders, supervised medication administration, a history of multiple hospitalizations, chronic suicidality and/or self-injury behaviours, a history of repeated suicide attempts)
- Students seeking on-going mandated treatment
- Students seeking formal psychological assessments (for example, for learning disabilities or ADHD)
- Students who require counselling to meet an academic requirement, or are interested in counselling solely to gain clinical experience
When off-campus therapy is recommended or preferred by a student, a counsellor will support the student through the process of getting connected. We will help to identify several referral options selected specifically for the student’s personal situation. Local counselling options include providers within walking distance to campus and some that provide low or sliding scale fee services.