Oregon State University- Cascades

The overall goal of this project is to create an effective and sufficient suicide prevention infrastructure for the OSU-Cascades campus in order to support student mental health and to identify, support and refer students at risk of suicide and those in crisis. Key activities include the development of policies and procedures to support students at risk of suicide or who are in nonsuicidal crisis, development of linkages between University services and those provided by the broader community, the creation of web-based information and supports, training in suicide prevention for faculty, staff, and students, and student generated projects to promote well being, help seeking and stigma reduction.

Although our campus population is primarily Caucasian, activities will seek to respond to the needs of higher risk populations such as veterans, American Indian, students who identify as LGBTQ and Hispanic females. OSU-Cascades expected influx of international students, particularly from China and Saudi Arabia will also receive special attention as they make the cultural transition from their home culture to the United States. With the anticipated growth in our campus, we expect to serve approximately 2500 students over the course of the grant period.

Project objectives include:

• Develop Student Support protocols for assisting students identified as at risk of suicide.
• Develop Crisis Intervention protocols for assisting students identified as in imminent risk of suicide (to? include safety planning and continuity of care for those hospitalized or seen in the emergency room).
• Develop Postvention protocols for supporting the campus in the event of a student’s death by suicide.
• Develop web-based supports to promote student mental health, help-seeking and stigma reduction.
• Train students, faculty, and staff on (1) identification of students at risk of suicide and (2) referral of at risk students using grant-developed Student Support and Crisis Intervention protocols, and (3) cultural competence.
• Develop culturally and linguistically appropriate informational materials for students and families.
• Document and assess programmatic efforts in order to determine (1) numbers of students, faculty, and staff trained in suicide prevention, (2) numbers of students identified and referred for services, (3) number of university-community collaborations established to support student well being and suicide prevention, (4) number of students exposed to mental health promotion messages.

Accomplishing these objectives will greatly increase the capacity of OSU-Cascades to respond to the mental health needs of its students.