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Senior gift: a donation to the Counseling Center

By Kaitlin McCabe ’16

Based upon the preference of an overwhelming majority, the Class of 2016 has chosen to donate to the Hamilton College Counseling Center as its official senior gift.

The senior gift is an established tradition at Hamilton, started in 1982 when the graduating class collectively chose to give to the annual fund as a commemoration of their time on the Hill. It was not until 1985, however, that the senior class officially selected a specific gift for the school. For over 20 years, the senior gift has achieved 90 percent participation, the Class of 2014 breaking records with a 98.1 percent participation.

This year’s Senior Gift Committee narrowed down the list of potential gifts to four options: donations to the Counseling Center, to an emergency aid fund for faculty members, to The Thomas B. Rudd Health Center, and to any area of the donor’s choosing.  As of Wednesday evening, 337 seniors participated in the Senior Gift selection, of which 182 (roughly 54 percent) voted for giving a donation to the counseling center. No other option received more than 75 votes: two received less than 50 each.

Some campus conversation and Yik Yak posts claimed that seniors “weren’t allowed” to offer physical gift options this year.  However, such claims are inaccurate; the students on the Gift Committee had the opportunity to nominate any and all reasonable gift ideas, and the participating students elected to show support for non-physical-gift options.

Director of the Counseling Center David Walden. expressed the Center’s collective excitement over the Class of 2016’s gift. “This gift will help ensure that the Counseling Center can continue to provide excellent service to all students in the coming years,” he said. “We have always sought to enhance students’ experiences at Hamilton by helping them work through any issues, big or small,  that come up in their lives here or at home, and by helping students solidify their knowledge about themselves and the world around them. Every student who is admitted to Hamilton has an opportunity to be successful here, and we want to help as much as we can to remove the barriers that could get in the way of that success.”

The Counseling Center, currently located on the second floor of the Thomas Rudd Health Center, holds a mission to “enhance and support the intellectual and personal growth of the Hamilton College Community.” Any enrolled student is eligible to seek help from the center free-of-charge for a variety of concerns, including relationship problems, family problems, depression, eating disorders, alcohol and drug abuse issues, anxiety, loneliness, homesickness and stress. Through therapy, the Office has helped students develop positive mental health and self-esteem, a sense of identity and meaningful relationships, as well as academic competencies, effective decision-making skills and a life-long approach to learning.

In addition to individual therapy, the Center offers group therapy, psychiatric services, dietitian services, consultation to students, faculty and staff, 24/7 emergency coverage and innovative programming like Wilderness Therapy and Therapy on the Rocks.

According to Walden, the Counseling Center has seen an 83 percent increase in demand since the 2011-12 academic year, and already into this year, there has been a 42 percent increase compared to last year at the same time. Walden explained, “Last year we saw 22.5 percent of the students on campus, and by graduation we will have seen a significant portion of any given graduating class.”

With the increase in demand obviously came the decrease in availability—a situation extremely unsettling to some members of the Hamilton community, especially those students who rely heavily upon weekly appointments with counselors. In an anonymous Student Assembly survey from Dec. 2013, a student expressed this distress in saying, “I really could have used someone to speak with this semester, but times were booked up three weeks in advance…If you need someone to talk to, you should have that option available.”

In response to this increase in demand, the Center has strived to find creative solutions, such as expanding group offerings and offering biofeedback, which Walden describes as “a new service that students can use anytime with no waiting, which helps increase their ability to focus and relax.”

Given these recent trends, the Center anticipates student demand will only continue to grow in the next several years, and services must be expanded in order to adequately meet such needs.

“This gift will help tremendously by providing some of the resources to do just that,” Walden said.

The exact language of the Senior Gift—what the money will go towards, areas of most need, etc.—has yet to be officially determined, but they will be discussed by representatives of the administration, the Counseling Center and the Senior Gift Committee in the near future.

While the donation to the Counseling Center is certainly encouraged, members of the Class of 2016 are also able to donate to any area of their choosing, whether that be the Art department, club rugby, student media, etc. All senior class donations, whether to the official Senior Gift or not, will be included in the class’s total participation.

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