Jerrod Koon was the first of three finalists in the search for the new student counseling services director to present at an open forum Tuesday in the Soults Family Visitors Center.

Koon is a licensed clinical psychologist at James Madison University’s Counseling Center in Harrisonburg, Virginia. He received his doctorate from the University of Iowa and would consider working in Iowa as returning home. 

Koon began his presentation by discussing the issue of the crisis of mental health on college campuses which has left college counseling services to face an overwhelming amount of clients, with a lack of resources.

“Counseling centers every year are sacrificing aspects of our identity in the name of efficiency,” Koon said. “We’re cutting out key services and relationships to make space for clinical demand.”

The model for an ideal counseling center that he promoted was the comprehensive counseling center model, this includes key priorities and programs such as: clinical services, consultation and collaboration, outreach and prevention programs and an efficient training program.

A key point Koon stressed is the importance of relentlessly promoting the resources that student counseling services have to offer. Student counseling services have just as big of a responsibility to promote mental health as they do to responding to mental illness, he said.

“Counseling centers have to be fully present and engaged across campus,” Koon said. “They should not be limited to a single office and do most of their work behind closed doors.”

His vision for Iowa State’s Student Counseling services if he were to become director includes: giving students immediate access to assessment and crisis services; clinical decisions that are driven and designed exclusively by student needs; services that are designed to provide clients with truly rehabilitated and transformative experiences; timely consultation that are available to anyone in our community; the ability to fearlessly promote and advertise the services offered and innovation that is driven by a desire to improve the quality and quantity of service.

“Every single person on our campus should know who we are and what we do,” Koon said. “We shouldn’t have to hide what it is because the people who may never walk through our door won’t have access to that.”

Finalist Kathryn Kominars will speak at an open forum Thursday and finalist Christopher Hanes will speak on Friday. More information about the next open forums can be found on the student affairs website.