By Phoenix Rising Centers
Roots & Resilience
Campus Care & Belonging
College mental health support grounded in students’ lives, relationships, and the communities they call home.
Discuss a campus partnershipFor colleges & universities
Space to grow.
- Student support
- Staff training
- Campus connection
A partnership for your campus
College mental health support grounded in students’ lives.
Bring culturally responsive student support, practical staff training, and a clearer path to care to your campus.
- Student support
- Staff training
- Access to care
Roots & Resilience is a partnership programme for colleges and universities seeking to better support students whose experiences of stress, identity, relationships, and belonging are shaped by the conditions around them.
We work alongside campus teams to develop focused programmes that connect student support with improvements to how care is offered and accessed.
Discuss a Campus PartnershipWhat students carry into college
Swipe or use the arrow keys to explore →
Family & finances
A student may be attending classes while helping their family pay rent.
Identity & safety
Another may be deciding whether it is safe to come out at home.
Energy & sensory needs
Someone who appears engaged in every seminar may spend the rest of the day recovering from masking or sensory overwhelm.
These experiences shape whether students have the time, privacy, trust, and resources to seek support.
Roots & Resilience · Campus partnerships
What we can build
with your campus
Student Care & Belonging Circles
Facilitated groups give students recurring space to explore shared experiences, build relationships, and consider what support could look like for them.
Cohorts can focus on:
- Family expectations, boundaries, and first-generation experiences.
- Queer and trans identity, relationships, and belonging.
- Neurodivergent experiences, masking, and exhaustion.
- Racism, migration, cultural disconnection, and community.
- Grief, caregiving, and changes in relationships.
We agree the focus, access arrangements, and group format with your campus. Students receive a clear explanation of the group’s purpose and choose what they share.
Practical Training for Student Support Teams
Faculty, advisers, residence staff, and programme leaders often become the first people students approach.
Training helps these teams respond thoughtfully, understand their role, and connect students with appropriate support. Topics can include responding to difficult disclosures, recognizing cultural and family pressures, supporting neurodivergent students, and making referrals without repeatedly asking students to retell painful experiences.
Sessions use situations relevant to your campus, with time to practice responses and discuss what staff need to follow through.
Campus Care Blueprint
We examine a defined part of the student support experience with your team and participating students.
Where do referrals stall? Are costs explained before someone books? Can a student working evenings attend the available appointments? Does an intake process require disclosure they are not ready to make?
Through focused conversations and a review of the agreed support pathway, we develop practical recommendations with priorities, responsible teams, and next steps.
Connections to Clinical Care
Some students need individual therapy or another form of clinical support alongside campus programming.
We can explore referral arrangements or separately funded therapy appointments through Phoenix Rising Centers, based on clinical fit, clinician availability, and service eligibility.
The scope, funding, and limits of clinical services are agreed separately so students and campus teams understand what is available before care begins.
Our approach to care
Why Phoenix Rising Centers
Phoenix Rising Centers approaches mental health through relationships, culture, history, and the material conditions of people’s lives.
Professional training & lived experience
Our collective includes Black, Brown, queer, trans, disabled, and neurodivergent therapists, including practitioners from immigrant and Global Majority communities. Professional training and lived experience inform how we understand care, while each student remains the authority on their own experience.
Care in its wider context
In campus work, that means asking how racism, financial pressure, family expectations, inaccessible processes, and institutional power may shape distress or make support harder to use.
Student choice & institutional change
It also means protecting student choice. We make room for different ways of communicating and participating, and work with campus teams on the conditions they have the power to improve.
Roots & Resilience · Getting started
Start with a focused campus pilot
An eight-week pilot gives your institution a defined starting point and a chance to learn what is useful before developing a longer partnership.
A starting pilot can include:
-
One student cohort
Six facilitated sessions for approximately 10–12 students.
-
Two staff workshops
Focused on the experiences and support needs relevant to that cohort.
-
A referral pathway review
Examining how students find and reach appropriate support.
-
A closing review
Aggregate feedback, practical recommendations, and priorities for the next term.
Together, we agree the student community, programme focus, recruitment responsibilities, delivery team, schedule, and investment before launch.
Discuss a Campus PilotRoots & Resilience · Working together
A partnership with follow-through
We work with Student Affairs, Student Success, counseling centers, accessibility services, residence life, and teams supporting first-generation, LGBTQ+, international, and multicultural student communities.
What we learn together
We review participation, student feedback, referral experiences, and progress on campus actions. Those findings help us decide together what to continue, adapt, or expand.
Roots & Resilience · Practical details
Questions about partnering
How does this work alongside our counseling center or existing provider?
We begin by understanding the services already available and where additional support could be useful. A partnership might focus on a particular student community, a recurring referral difficulty, or staff training. We agree roles and referral arrangements with the relevant campus teams.
Are the student groups therapy?
The starting pilot is designed around facilitated support and education. Clinical therapy groups require a separate agreement and clinical arrangements. Each group is clearly described before enrolment so students understand its purpose and the support it provides.
How is a partnership funded?
Colleges fund the agreed programme through a departmental, shared, or sponsored budget. Pricing reflects the number of groups and workshops, preparation, coordination, and level of campus consultation.
We provide a written proposal with the scope, fees, and responsibilities before work begins. Separately arranged therapy has its own funding terms. Any student costs are explained before enrolment or booking.
What information does the college receive?
Routine programme reports focus on participation, broad feedback, and agreed campus actions. Treatment notes and identifiable student stories are not included in these reports.
We agree privacy and reporting arrangements before launch, including how to avoid identifying students in small groups. Students receive information about confidentiality, its limits, and how their information will be used.
Can you support students virtually or during academic breaks?
Virtual delivery can be included in the programme plan. For clinical care, eligibility depends on the student’s physical location at the time of the appointment and the clinician’s authorization to practice there. We confirm availability and any arrangements for academic breaks before making commitments.
Does the programme provide emergency or round-the-clock support?
Roots & Resilience does not provide a 24-hour crisis service. Before launch, we agree how participants will be directed to appropriate urgent and after-hours support, alongside the campus’s existing arrangements.
How is this different from IMTW?
Roots & Resilience focuses on students and the campus practices affecting their support and belonging. Inclusive Minds, Thriving Workplaces focuses on employees, leadership, and working conditions.
Training faculty to support students fits within Roots & Resilience. Supporting faculty and staff with their own workplace experiences fits within IMTW. We can discuss both when your institution needs support across these areas.
Roots & Resilience · Let’s talk
Tell us where support is getting stuck
You may already know which students are struggling to access care. You may be hearing the same concerns across several departments, or looking for a more consistent way to support a particular student community.
Tell us what your team is noticing and what you hope to make possible. We’ll explore whether a focused partnership is a useful next step.
Looking for therapy for yourself? Explore care through Phoenix Rising Centers.