Community and Technical Colleges Story Archives - West Virginia Public Broadcasting

HEPC Supports Campus Mental Health With Grants

West Virginia’s public colleges and universities are getting help to address the mental health needs of students.

Sept. 10 is World Suicide Prevention Day and in observance, the Higher Education Policy Commission is distributing more than $70,000 in Campus Mental Health Grants to nine institutions across the state.

The individual grants range from more than $6,000 to $12,000 dollars for campus programs including mental health screenings and substance-free activities to promote community on campus.

Most of the grant recipients are community and technical colleges.

Mountwest Community and Technical College
Mountwest will introduce preventative measures, including skill training, mental health screenings, and reducing access to lethal means, aimed at providing early support for student mental health and mitigating worsening symptoms.

Southern West Virginia Community and Technical College
Southern will implement a comprehensive mental health screening tool across its campuses in five counties, addressing mental health challenges exacerbated by socioeconomic factors. The tool will help identify mental health issues early, promoting academic success and mental health resilience.

Eastern Community and Technical College
The Mindfulness in Motion: Mending Minds Together project will conduct routine mental health screenings and use student feedback to set mindfulness priorities. The initiative will foster a supportive campus environment with activities focused on mental health, addiction recovery, and suicide prevention.

BridgeValley Community and Technical College
The Nourishment for Nursing program will provide nursing students with tools to boost both academic performance and mental wellness, expanding on its success with retention rates. Additionally, a new Paramedic Pause Curriculum will offer mental health resources for paramedic students.

Pierpont Community and Technical College
The Stress Less for Success Wellness Program will address non-academic personal barriers to student success, featuring life skills workshops and mindfulness activities aimed at decreasing student dropout rates.

West Virginia University, Concord University, and West Virginia State University are the only four year institutions receiving grants.

West Virginia State University
The Resilient STATE of Mind program provides innovative, community-led solutions to promote resilience in young adults aged 18-24 to advance mental health and well-being and reduce the risk for negative mental health outcomes. This project will provide bi-weekly educational meetings focused on self-esteem, mindfulness, social skills, and coping mechanisms.

West Virginia University
WVU’s Collegiate Recovery Program will combat student loneliness by expanding substance-free activities that foster peer connections. The grant will support increased capacity for these programs, helping to create a campus culture that reduces stigma and encourages belonging.

Concord University
Concord Connect: Building Belonging will cultivate community and inclusion through mentorship, activities, and support networks, ensuring students feel valued and connected to their university.

West Virginia State University & BridgeValley Community and Technical College
In collaboration, WVSU Counseling and Wellness Services will host a one-day Suicide Prevention Conference in Spring 2025. The event will bring together mental health professionals, educators, and students to discuss innovative suicide prevention strategies and foster collaboration across institutions.

These projects are awarded by the commission’s Health Sciences Division, which, among other initiatives, works to improve student mental health, wellness, and safety.

“Supporting the mental health and well-being of our students is critical to ensuring their academic success and overall development,” Sarah Armstrong Tucker, West Virginia’s chancellor of Higher Education said in a press release. “These grants are an important step in addressing the unique mental health challenges that many of our students face. We are proud to support these innovative programs and to work with our colleges and universities to create safer, more supportive environments for all students.”

Most West Virginia Community Colleges to Hike Fees

All but one of West Virginia’s public community and technical colleges are planning to increase tuition and fees for associate’s degrees.

West Virginia Higher Education Policy Commission official Matt Turner tells The Charleston Gazette-Mail that the Community and Technical College System presumes the colleges have already approved the average increase of 2.6 percent. CTSC data shows the average yearly cost will increase to $4,040 next academic year.

Eastern West Virginia is the only school that will not raise tuition and fees.

Mountwest is implementing the highest proposed increase, at 7.2 percent, which comes around to $270. That hike brings its annual cost to $4,014, still slightly below the average.

Despite passing the state Senate, a bill to make such colleges tuition-free failed in the House of Delegates this legislative session.

Senate Education Committee Paves the Way for Free Community College Programs

Updated: January 24, 2018 at 11:05 a.m.

The Senate Education Committee passed a bill that would make community and technical college free for some West Virginians.

Senate Bill 284 creates Advances Career Education, or ACE, programs that aim to fulfill workforce needs by connecting secondary schools with community and technical colleges.

The bill also creates the West Virginia Invests Grant Program, which would cover tuition costs for students after other financial aid has been applied.

The grant program will cost about $7 million, according to a fiscal note affixed to the bill from the Community & Technical College Education System. That fiscal note takes into consideration the age eligibility requirement of 20, which was in the introduced version of the bill.

According to another fiscal note from the West Virginia Department of Education, the ACE program will come at no cost to that department.

An amendment proposed by Sen. Mike Romano of Harrison County changed the age eligibility requirement for the grant from 20 to 18 and also includes anyone with a high school diploma or equivalent certification.

“My biggest problem with this bill — maybe it’s a fiscal one, maybe that’s why they did it: why would you make kids wait to 20 years old to take advantage of it?” Romano asked the committee’s counsel.

The committee’s substitute of the bill also includes home school and non-public school students in addition to public school students.

The bill now heads to the Senate Finance Committee.

W.Va. Lawmakers Eye Redistricting, Free College

West Virginia lawmakers have begun advancing proposals for redistricting House of Delegates seats and providing free community and technical college during their first full week of their 2018 session.

Hundreds of other bills have been freshly introduced, several at the request of the Justice administration.

Those include the plan to fund residents’ tuition toward college associate’s degrees in technical trades and help vocational high school students gain college credits.

Many senators have voiced support, though some say they want to ensure the programs apply to students who are home schooled or attend private schools. Another hearing is scheduled next week.

The redistricting bill, which has advanced to the House floor, would establish 100 House districts following the 2020 Census, each with a single delegate. Now some larger districts among 67 currently have multiple delegates.

CTCs Helping Students Get Out of Developmental 'Quicksand'

Community and technical colleges have started noticing a trend that’s consistent not just here in West Virginia, but across the country.

That trend: students who are enrolled in developmental courses when they enter a higher education institution are less likely to graduate.

“Thirteen percent of the students that go into developmental or remedial courses graduate, only 13 percent,” Chancellor of West Virginia’s CTC system James Skidmore told members of the state Board of Education during their May meeting.

Skidmore said 64 percent of first time community college students in the state test into developmental or remedial courses, meaning they aren’t ready to take on college level classes in English or math.

“What’s happening, they’re getting caught up in the developmental education process,” he said. “Some students have to take three levels of developmental, some students have to take one, some have to take two.”

“I refer to it as the quicksand of higher education. Students get in developmental and they never get out.”

Complete College America statistics show similar numbers nationally and the organization, of which West Virginia is a part, has come up with a method to reduce those numbers. Skidmore said West Virginia is looking to take that approach.

Instead of taking remediation courses which do not count for college credit, West Virginia community colleges will begin offering co-requisites. These are courses that count as a college level English or math class, but have additional support for the students that need it.

That support can come in three forms:

Bootcamps: a five week prep course to prepare students for college level classes
Additional Time: 45-minute tutoring meetings following each class or additional class sessions
Proctored labs: scheduled computer labs where students work on the areas the struggle in with a member of the college’s faculty

Each community and technical college across the state will choose which of the three models will work best for them based on the programs they offer and the types of students they attract.

Skidmore said colleges are not limited to one method, but they must have at least one for both math and English fully implemented by the fall of 2015.