Iowa State’s Cyclone Support Central has opened space in Parks Library, offering a “one-stop shop” for students’ mental health and wellbeing needs.
Melea Licht, the library communications manager, said the center is designed to offer a flexible programming space.
“Units and departments on campus can email [email protected], and then they can tell us when they’re interested in what type of program they’d like to offer,” Licht said. “All programs and Cyclone Support Central need to be open to all students.”
Licht said the space holds about 40 people, and it will be open from 7 a.m. to midnight during the weekdays. On weekends, the space will close an hour earlier than regular library hours.
“We also have conversation pods in the corner, so if folks want to do a resume review, they want to connect with a counselor or different things that are happening in this space,” Licht said. “We want them to come in, relax, take a minute to unwind. We’ve got puzzles, aromatherapy, and we’ve got some massage, canes, mindfulness, waiting and an art station.”
Furthermore, Licht said the space blossomed with the Cyclone Support initiative.
“So what you see is the result of that partnership, taking Cyclone Support resources and giving a physical space to that,” Licht said.
Katy Cran, strategic communications advisor for the division of student affairs, said the idea sparked after COVID-19.
“We were experiencing a lot of students that needed mental health support, and so I think our knee-jerk reaction is to send a student to counseling [and] that’s not always the best solution for most of our students,” Cran said.
Cran explained that the space provides a one-stop shop for students to get help where they need it.
“There’s so many great things happening at Iowa State but students don’t know where to even go,” Cran said. “We’re assessing what we’re doing to make sure it works for our students.”
Cran said the activities in the space will vary depending on what time of year it is.
“We’ll have stuff around midterms, around finals, also things around career fairs,” Cran said. “Our pop-up shops [and] our free haircuts [will] depend on what’s going on that semester, that week, but then we [also] encourage campus partners to come in and do a program.”
Hilary Seo, the Dean of the University Library, said so much has changed in the academic research library that they realized they are not a traditional library.
“It’s not about books in the building and students just using spaces,” Seo said. “It’s really about the services that we provide, and we recognize that everything has changed on campus. There’s so many opportunities for students, and it is so stressful for students. We wanted to make sure that we can provide them access to resources, but making sure that they can come up to the things on campus that can help.”
Seo said last fall, they engaged with nearly 1000 students before they opened.
“We hope to have more programming and again, connecting students to opportunities on campus, to the support they need,” Seo said. “I think we’re going to have folks here helping with cover letters and resumes… fantastic resources. We hope advisors come in and use the space to connect with their students.”
Seo said the space will also be used for mental health support.
“Just having the ability to connect a student to someone who they can talk to to help them understand what they’re really feeling, the challenge they’re facing and making sure that they can talk to an expert, someone who can help them,” Seo said.
Samundra Karki, a graduate student in mechanical engineering, said he hadn’t heard about this space before but it’s an interesting venue for students to engage with.
“I think it would be pretty nice for students to have to overcome whatever they are going through,” Karki said.
Karki said he thinks the space is cool, and he liked the conversation pods, the games and the books.
“I think I’ll be more than excited to come back here and try to relax,” Karki said.
To learn more about Cyclone Support Central and the Cyclone Support program as a whole, visit this website.