Mental Wellness at SCU

Wellness Center builds programs and grows presence on campus

A year and a half after the Burnout Broncos was renamed and reconstructed as a group that focuses on community building for those practicing sobriety, it has expanded from a few active members to over 20.

The Burnout Broncos group, which is Santa Clara’s Collegiate Recovery Program, is just one way the Wellness Center has expanded in the past two school years. 

Kelly Schumacher and Tiger Simpson, the new Director and Assistant Director of the Wellness Center, were both hired in the Summer and Fall of 2018. 

“Before the two of us started in Fall 2018, the Wellness Center had not been fully staffed with two professionals in—as I understand it—five years,” Schumacher said

Schumacher and Simpson spent the 2018-2019 school year rebuilding the foundation for the Wellness Center. With their groundwork finished, they have been able to build upon the already existing programs and launch new ones. 

Located across from Swig Residence Hall on Market Street, the Wellness Center focuses on early intervention related to alcohol and drug use and the prevention of gender-based violence. They’re known for planning large-scale university-wide events like CARE Week in February, Sexual Assault Awareness Month during April, and Mental Health Awareness Month during May. 

While the Cowell Center and Counseling and Psychological Services (CAPS) have similar missions to support the student body’s well-being, these two entities are separate from the Wellness Center and only focus on providing students with medical and psychological services. 

This quarter, the Wellness Center launched the Alcohol and Other Drug Education (AODE) program, which serves as a recovery ally training program similar to other initiatives on campus like Safe Space Training. 

“Students who choose not to engage and especially students who are in recovery are a population that I don’t think we talk enough about on how to support,” Schumacher said. “Because we just assume everyone is out drinking and it’s hard not to assume that.”

The Center’s pre-existing groups like the Violence Peer Educators and Burnout Broncos have had the opportunity to grow under the new leadership of the Wellness Center.

Seniors Sigi Rodriguez and Mac Inch currently run the Burnout Broncos group together. 

The group focuses on community building for those in recovery or for those hoping to be in recovery. 

Every week, Rodriguez and Inch host two meetings for students to check in with one another. Once a month, the group goes out together to do activities like going to an escape room or to a San Jose Sharks game. 

“We’ve been able to create a community where people can come and discuss what’s going on in their lives and seek out help, but most of all have a core group of friends who don’t have to drink…to have a good time,” Inch said. 

Rodriguez thinks it is important to embrace the fact that sobriety is becoming a growing culture on campus, nationwide, and globally.

“Statistically more young people between the ages of 18-25 are getting sober, which is encouraging,” Rodriguez said. “If Santa Clara was ahead of the curve on that, that could be a real encouragement and would attract a lot of people that weren’t originally thinking about Santa Clara.”

From Rodriguez’s first year at Santa Clara to now, he’s noticed a small deterrence in the drinking culture. Part of this trend could be due to the increase in university-owned housing surrounding campus, which places more students under the jurisdiction of Campus Safety.

“A lot of people are more afraid of getting rolled up by Campus Safety than they are by Santa Clara PD,” Rodriguez said. 

The idea for the Burnout Broncos came out of a pre-existing group on campus called Broncos In Recovery, which was formed by another student in January 2017.  

The original vision for a Collegiate Recovery Program at Santa Clara was to create a residential-based community for recovery, but the idea transitioned into the creation of Broncos In Recovery. 

“There’s been a lot of pushback the last couple years on [sober living housing], so it’s kind of on the back burner,” Rodriguez said. “But in the meantime, we want to focus on community-based recovery.”

Once Schumacher arrived, the group officially changed their name to the Burnout Broncos and was able to achieve more success with her support. 

As Rodriguez sees it, the way to keep working on creating awareness is to continue having dialogue about the issues present at Santa Clara.

“You can’t just sweep it under the rug,” Rodriguez said. “You have to shine the light and take it for what it is and try to address it and deal with it the best way you can.” 

Contact Kyle de la Fuente at kdelafuente@scu.edu or call (408) 554-4852.