Savannah State University

• Savannah State University: Enrollment 4,000 (approx.)
• City of Savannah: 132,410 residents

Savannah State University (SSU) was originally founded as the Georgia State Industrial College for Colored Youth in 1890. It is the oldest public historically black college and university (HBCU) in Georgia and the oldest institution of higher learning in the historic city of Savannah.

Background

Echoing the mission of Savannah State University, which is “ . . . to foster engaged learning and personal growth in a student-centered environment that celebrates the African American legacy while nurturing a diverse student body,” one of the unit goals of the Division of Student Affairs is to increase collaboration in order to promote student development. This has been the vision of Jacqueline Awe, director of student development, in her quest to enhance social functioning of students through interventions geared at their social and collegial environments.

The licensed social worker and SSU alumna was hired as a counselor at Savannah State University in 2004 and was then designated the disability services coordinator as well. The former comprehensive counseling services had been restructured and Awe quickly realized that she could not do everything by herself, especially since students were coming to her office with so many different needs, such as alcohol and other drug problems, sexual assault, and relationship issues, among others.

“It was too much for one person, so I decided to start working with student volunteers to develop some peer-to-peer programs to promote health and well-being at Savannah State, based on a campus community model using a public health approach,” said Awe.

One way that Awe developed collaborative relationships was to join the boards of a number of organizations, including the Georgia College Counseling Association, the Savannah branch of the National Alliance on Mental Illness, and the Rape Crisis Center, Inc. (RCC).

According to Awe, these connections, as well as contacts with other community groups, enable her to draw on resources to support activities and programs on campus. For example, she has involved staff and volunteers from the community-based RCC in campus activities as speakers on engaging bystanders in violence prevention and prevention of violence against women; as consultants to help define the goals of programming; as participants in rallies; as co-facilitators in a monthly relationship group session; and as trainers for and as community advocate members of the campus Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault Prevention Task Force (the Lighthouse Project). Awe said, “They are a staple on campus, and many students know them by name and have contacted RCC directly for programming. Their presence and work is becoming normalized at our institution.”

Other collaboration activities include partnerships with Savannah Care Center (a local crisis pregnancy center), which provides services on campus every Monday, and with Savannah Area Family Emergency Shelter, Inc. (SAFE Shelter), which provides training and also has a representative on the Lighthouse Project. These agencies also partner with neighboring South University to provide practicum opportunities for students in the graduate professional counseling program and to work alongside the social work interns who do internships in SSU’s Division of Student Affairs.

Awe also has a weekly radio show called Stir It Up on the SSU station WHCJ (90.3 FM). It is a public service radio station that airs both on campus and in the community. This is another example of collaborative effort in which campus and community representatives come together to do one hour of health education each week. She invites guests from local organizations and groups that focus on wellness issues to talk about their programs and the social concerns they address. Research demonstrates that radio stations that target African American audiences (“black radio”) reach a national African American audience daily, making black radio an ideal medium for health promotion and disparities reduction in the African American community. Black radio can be used to communicate public health messages and to recruit African Americans into public health research.

“The organizations get free air time to advertise their services and we get to let our students know about resources in the community. Sometimes those guests feel so much gratitude that I get favors in return. It is a valuable connection in the community that I can call on to come to campus and present information on various topics for our ‘Lunch and Learn’ sessions. They come because we have that amicable relationship,” said Awe.

The department does a lot of volunteer recruiting and has three active student programs within the Division of Student Affairs: the Lighthouse Project, Against All Odds (Behavioral Health Coalition), and Student Health and Wellness Focus group. They spearhead a number of prevention education and information dissemination on campus.

As an HBCU, SSU has participated in activities offered by the Historically Black Colleges and Universities Center for Excellence (HBCU-CFE) in Substance Abuse and Mental Health at Morehouse School of Medicine, which is funded through a cooperative agreement with the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration’s Center for Substance Abuse Treatment and Center for Mental Health Services.

In fall 2009 SSU received a mental health mini grant from the center for a stigma reduction campaign called “HELP! is not a bad 4 letter word.” Its focus is to encourage healthy help-seeking behaviors on campus through a mix of interventions.

“Students are very familiar with that motto because whenever we do anything, it is on everything. There is an entire discourse that could be started around this theme. We even use that motto at the end of our radio show. When I sign off I say, ‘Don’t forget to get help, because HELP! is not a bad four-letter word.’ The motto is so familiar even our president knows it. When I was at our spring freshman orientation table, President Yarbrough stopped by to see how we were doing. As he walked away he turned and said, ‘Don’t forget, HELP! is not a bad four-letter word.’ You never know how far your message gets out,” said Awe.

Prevention Programming

The $10,000 grant from the HBCU-CFE prompted SSU to conduct a multifaceted approach to information dissemination, outreach awareness, and community partnering. It also started a new student coalition on suicide prevention called Against All Odds, which now has nine student members from the fields of social work, sociology, behavior analysis, psychology, and biology, and one faculty and four staff members. One activity of this coalition has been to help set up either a counseling resource room or a counseling resource area in each residence hall so that students have ready access to brochures and other mental health–related materials and information.

“We have a bulletin board and brochure holders in every residence hall with our motto, ‘HELP! is not a bad 4 letter word.’ We also made a door hanger for every door on campus, including the faculty doors, that includes toll-free numbers and Web sites for virtually any type of help. One side of the hanger has information about HBCU-CFE and SSU’s counseling center. The other side includes information on Alcoholics Anonymous, hospitals, and Georgia Crisis Access Number, to name a few that people can call to get help 24/7. And like all our materials it also has our prevention motto,” said Awe.

SSU is also using some of the grant for training some SSU staff and students—including the chief of police, director of student development, coordinator of ethics, coordinator of disability, and students in the behavioral coalition—to become QPR (Question, Persuade and Refer) instructors, who will conduct trainings across campus each semester. One staff member and the human resources training coordinator are trained in mental health first aid. The director of student development and Health Center personnel are also pursuing prevention specialist credentialing. “The goal is to use only evidence-based models to do training and outreach on campus,” said Awe.

Raising Awareness

In spring 2010 SSU participated in some awareness activities that garnered press coverage. For example, in a fun way to address a serious issue, men students at SSU walked around campus in women's shoes in a march called “Walk a Mile in Her Shoes.” It's an effort to raise awareness about violence against women and encourage empathy. This is the second year for the event, which is sponsored by the campus groups, the Lighthouse Project, and Men Can Stop Rape (new chapter on campus), and was part of the observance of Sexual Assault Awareness Month.

On April 27, 2010, SSU students participated in a Take Back the Night march in downtown Savannah Forsyth Park. The march, which was sponsored by the Rape Crisis Center, was designed to empower victims, raise awareness, and educate men who may be at risk of inciting violence. Awe said, “That Friday was the scene of a protest just about anyone would want to join.”

Conclusions

After placing first place in the HBCU-CFE Mental Health Promotion Public Service Announcement Competition, Awe and the SSU team are already looking forward to repeating their success in next year’s competition. “I am excited about the wonderful opportunities that are being made available for HBCUs through the Center for Excellence. They flood us with information like never before . . . or maybe I am paying more attention than I have before,” said Awe.

Awe is optimistic about the future when it comes to prevention programming at SSU. An addition to their counseling team started in August 2010 and efforts will be specifically focused on residential programming. Her department received a grant that will end in September 2010 to end violence on university and college campuses from ENSYNC Diversified Management Services, Inc., which is based in Florida. The project, which is funded by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, involves SSU and three universities in Florida. Awe is also working with Steven O’Neil, the director of Georgia BASICS (Brief Assessment, Screening, Intervention Continuum of Care System) to enhance substance intervention programming on campus. She plans to continue applying for additional grants to supplement current budgets and improve the quality of services that are provided in the Division of Student Affairs.

Awe believes that it takes motivation, strong administrative support, time, access to resources, connection to advocacy organizations and individuals who are truly concerned and an ability to really enjoy and empathize with people to be successful in prevention or risk-reduction work.

Additional Information

For more information, go to www.savannahstate.edu/student-affairs.