serve them better,” he said. “That was the impetus for the Barnes Center.” Evanovich sees the Center as part of Chancellor Kent Syverud’s larger effort to improve the student experience for all students, something he hopes becomes a Syracuse superlative. “We’re attracting students that maybe a traditional recreation center or a traditional health center might not attract,” he said, noting that the e-gaming club now has 600 members compared to about 290 last year.
“When you combine all of these resources together, you have an opportunity to think holistically across the student body and bring more people into the tent.” The fact that the Barnes Center has something for everyone takes on a slightly different meaning for Cory Wallack, PhD, the Center’s Executive Director. He sees the facility as a primary entry point for a variety of mental health service options matched to the acuity of the student coming through the door. “For me, a lot of our work is about understanding how we can support mental health and wellness
that’s not entirely therapistdependent and then how we get the right people to the right therapist,” he said. Wallack is utilizing what he calls a hybrid model of “stepped care” with the addition of “drop-in” counseling. Stepped care is described as “a system of delivering and monitoring mental health treatment so that the most effective, yet least resource intensive treatment, is delivered first, only “stepping up” to intensive/specialist services as required and depending on the level of patient distress or need.” Wallack believes that using stepped care can help address what he sees as a problem across the board in student mental health – the idea that students of varying need are offered the same therapeutic model. Wallack, like his colleagues in counseling centers
Photo courtesy of Photo courtesy of Syracuse University
Pet therapy at The Barnes Center. 44
Mackenzie Mertikas
Mackenzie Anne Mertikas, President of Syracuse’s Student Association, helped organize the school’s mental health week.