As daylight recedes earlier and the Oregon rain returns, many college students find themselves confronting difficulties with their mental health. A recent study conducted by the Healthy Minds Network at the University of Michigan noted that 37% of students reported moderate to severe symptoms of depression, and 32% showed signs of anxiety. As the colder, darker months have arrived, seasonal affective disorder (SAD), a type of depression that worsens around seasonal changes, becomes another concern in the battle of mental health.
To examine these trends’ relevance to Lewis & Clark’s student body, The Mossy Log sat down with Director of Counseling and Associate Vice President of Student Health and Well-Being Robin Keillor.
“There are seasonal impacts, and multiple factors at play. When the days are shorter and darker, we’re not getting as much exposure to natural sunlight, and natural sunlight helps boost our mood. People are often very busy and may stay indoors all day, which can cause them to feel more sluggish or lower in their mood,” Keillor said.
Keillor noted that decreased light can throw off a student’s circadian rhythms, leading to irregular sleep patterns, something already common among college students. The Student Counseling Center often sees an increase in drop-ins and crisis visits among midterm periods, a time that coincides with worsening weather and high academic stress.
“It’s a little bit of a chicken and the egg,” Keillor said. “Is it academic pressure, the seasonal changes, or all of the above?”
LC has invested heavily in mental health support for students. According to Keilor, this fall semester, the Student Counseling Center has already served 277 students. Over the past four years, 1,973 students have used the center’s services, averaging nearly 500 students per year.
Meanwhile, the Student Health Center provided mental health support to 71 students in the 2024-25 academic year, with 34 students seen this fall alone. These figures suggest a large portion of the student body — roughly 15% — has engaged with professional help on campus this semester, and 25% a year, something Keillor considers a positive sign of reduced stigma. “We really try to normalize seeking support,” she said.
Keillor emphasized that student mental health does not need to cross a line of severity to warrant seeking help.
“There’s not a threshold for what’s ‘serious enough,’” Keillor said. “It’s preventive work on anything. If you hear a little ping in your car it might be helpful to go and get that checked out before something really serious comes.”
The Student Counseling Center offers a range of services, from one-time consultations and ongoing individual therapy to group and relationship counseling sessions. For students navigating more complex circumstances, staff can connect them with off-campus providers or discuss medication options through the Student Health Center.
“We have changed our service delivery model significantly to reduce the wait times for both initial appointments and/or ongoing case assignment,” Keillor noted.
For those struggling specifically with SAD or lower mood during the winter months, LC also offers practical tools.
“At the Health Promotion and Wellness Office, (students) can check out for short-term blue lights. These are therapeutic lights that some people may find beneficial if they’re struggling specifically with the lack of natural light during the day. If they’re thinking that they might be having a seasonal response, seasonal affective disorder, for instance, they can experiment with trying out the blue lights before investing in one,” Keillor said.
The availability of light therapy lamps is part of a broader effort to make wellness accessible and adaptable. Other campus partners, such as the Health Promotion and Wellness Office and the Palatine Support Network, host tabling events, outreach sessions and peer-led programs that encourage conversation around mental well-being.
While Keillor observes consistent demand for counseling, Professor of Psychology Jerusha Detweiler-Bedell says there may be signs of stabilization, if not slight improvement, in national trends.
“We are seeing national trends among college students that seem to be decreasing in terms of mental health difficulties,” Detweiler-Bedell said. “It’s not dramatically different, but there’s a slight decline, especially in diagnoses of anxiety and depression.”
Detweiler-Bedell attributes this modest improvement to several factors, including a post-pandemic adjustment period and greater access to mental health resources for students nationwide.
“We all have had our experiences when things shut down, but many students at that time were used to remote learning. There was less socialization in the classroom. There was social isolation. We saw an uptick nationwide, not just among young people, in terms of mental health challenges during COVID. I think that for students who were exiting high school and transitioning into college as things were beginning to open up, the challenge was to adjust again,” Detweiler-Bedell said.
Detweiler-Bedell thinks there are many factors that contribute to the rise in rates of anxiety and depression.
“Really importantly, I want to emphasize COVID is not the only cause of anxiety and depression,” Detweiler-Bedell said. “I think that’s a contributing factor that both led to an uptick as well as a more recent downturn of rates. But another thing that I think has contributed over the past few years is continuing expansion of the type of mental health supports that we offer.”
Detweiler-Bedell also noted that remote therapy has become a lasting benefit of the pandemic years.
“As an example, college students who may have had a therapist somewhere else in the state of Oregon, if they’re still here, their therapist license would certainly be able to cover them getting treatment remotely. That continuity of care, that type of support could lead to better management of symptoms,” Detweiler-Bedell said.
With the end of daylight savings time on Nov. 3, students may notice changes in their sleep or energy levels due to disruptions in their circadian rhythm and reduced exposure to natural daylight. But Detweiler-Bedell pointed out that the current time setting is actually better for human biological rhythms.
“The most important signal to your body in terms of calibrating your levels of alertness is the sun in the morning,” Detweiler-Bedell said. “Because we put our clocks back, then the sun is a little bit higher in the morning, which starts our bodies. It activates that wake drive and gets us going. It’s also true of our body’s natural biological processes that it’s easier for most people to stay up a little bit later and to sleep in than it is to force your body to sleep earlier and to get up early.”
Both Detweiler-Bedell and Keillor urge students to reevaluate their core need for sleep in these darker months.
“Socialization, physical activity, finding small comforts or things that bring you some of those cozy feelings even in the darker months. Keeping a good nighttime bedtime routine and trying to get up regularly at the same time are really powerful tools for coping in the winter months,” Detweiler-Bedell said.
Keillor echoed a similar sentiment, reminding students to prioritize their essential needs.
“There are certain building blocks that we all know really make a significant difference in our health and our mental health. Those are sleep, eating a relatively balanced diet, staying connected with other humans and being social, not isolating. … Try to stay connected with your people,” Keillor said.
As winter settles in, LC’s Student Counseling Center and its partners continue to expand outreach, reduce barriers and remind students that seeking help is a sign of strength, not a sign of weakness.
“We really want to serve every single student, and every student is a human who has stress in their life,” Keillor added. “There’s room for everybody.”
Students in urgent need of psychological assistance should call the Student Counseling Center at 503-768-7160. A Crisis Counseling Service is available to students at 503-265-7804 whenever the Student Counseling Center is closed or staff are unavailable. If you or a loved one are facing a mental crisis, text BRAVE to 741-741 or call the Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 988 for free, 24/7 confidential support.
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