Regents up state request by $1M for campus mental health resources

IOWA CITY — Before approving its state appropriations request in advance of the upcoming Legislative session, Iowa’s Board of Regents on Thursday tacked on another $1 million specifically for “extended mental health resources at our three regent universities.”

That $1 million addition will bring the board’s total ask to $39.3 million more than the $580.7 it received this year — or $620 million.

Regent Abby Crow — serving as the board’s student regent as she works as a University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics nursing assistant — suggested the appropriations-request amendment after regents met this week with student leaders across the campuses.

“A central point of our conversation was the need to extend mental health services and the benefits this will bring to students at our regent universities,” Crow said during the board’s meeting Thursday on the UI campus. “Student leaders also provided us with a unanimous letter imploring us as regents to support their efforts for expanded mental health resources and funding. And noted several excellent examples of direct impacts on programming and staffing that having extended funding could allow at each of the institutions.”

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This, Crow said, isn’t the first the regents have heard from students about the need for more mental health services at the University of Iowa, Iowa State University, and University of Northern Iowa.

"In light of these ongoing discussions, I would like to make a motion to amend the fiscal year 2025 state appropriations request to include an additional $1 million to support our university's efforts for extended mental health resources at our three regent universities,“ Crow said.

The board — excluding President Michael Richards, who was absent for the meeting — unanimously approved the amendment and the full appropriations ask, without discussion, after Crow noted the students also asked to be involved in conversations going forward “regarding the specific allocation of this funding.”

“And offer their insight as to what specific mental health-related resources, programming, or staffing might be the most good at their respective institutions,” Crow said.

A UI-specific version of the National College Health Assessment — administered to thousands of students in the spring — found an increase in reports of self-harm, diagnosed mental health conditions, and students receiving services.

Among UI undergraduates who responded to the spring health survey, 56 percent said they had at some point in their life received psychological or mental health services, up from 50 percent who said so in 2021. Nearly 38 percent reported receiving services within the last year, up from 33 percent in 2021.

UI graduate students reported similar increases. And both groups reported as their “top conditions ever diagnosed” as anxiety, depression, and attention deficit disorder.

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Iowa State’s most recent national health survey from 2021 found 23 percent of its female respondents had experienced “serious psychological distress,” while 53 percent of women and 47 percent of men were “positive for loneliness.”

According to that survey, 27 percent of the female respondents were “positive for suicidal screening,” along with 23 percent of men.

The rest of the regents’ request of lawmakers in the upcoming session includes $14.8 million for “general university” dollars — breaking down to $4.5 million each for UI and Iowa State and $5.8 million for UNI.

That, UNI President Mark Nook said Thursday, is the most important part of his campus’ request, “so that we can hold tuition flat for a year and develop some differentiation in our tuition relative to others public institutions in the state.”

In states surrounding Iowa, Nook said, the cost difference between research-intensive campuses like UI and ISU and regional comprehensive universities like UNI is about $3,500.

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“In 2017, that difference was $88 here in the state of Iowa,” Nook said. “We've grown that to just a little over $1,000. I'd like to continue to be able to do that. It will certainly help with enrollment trends. But it will more importantly help the people in Iowa have choices.”

In addition to that general education increase, all three campuses have made significant “special purpose requests” — including $10 million for a UI initiative to address rural health care needs; $10 million for an Iowa State STEM workforce program; and $2.5 million for a UNI initiative to increase educators across the state.

Vanessa Miller covers higher education for The Gazette.

Comments: (319) 339-3158; vanessa.miller@thegazette.com