Depression Among College Students in the US - Implementation and Evaluation

Problem Definition: High prevalence of depression among college students in the US from the years 1985 to 2010

The primary intervention decided upon revision from the last blog entry to the outline of the final paper will be the promotion of student organize clubs and organizations along with the funding of recreational facilities on campus. The crux of this intervention relies on the fact that those who are physically active tend to exhibit better mental health, while the student organizations will be able to provide both support and community for students on campus. The plan itself focuses on stress as its key determinant, and the programs implemented would seek to reduce said stress from the college environment.

The implementation of the plan will require both a substantial amount of funding on behalf of the institutions and the support and involvement of students on campus. Ideally, the student groups would be ethnically or culturally inspired and ran by upperclassman for the incoming freshman of institution. The stakeholders in this case would be students who would join the organizations and upperclassmen needed to get the group off the ground, while the university itself would need to provide initial funding for these clubs before they can fund raise and function on their own.

The recreational center would certainly be a long term project for schools and benefits would far outweigh the initial costs, but these costs would be high. Depending on the institution, the school would need to set aside revenue or look to alumni to aid in funding this venture, and this could only be accomplished if they approved of the reasons behind creating these centers. The additions can range from a modest addition of a volleyball net of basketball hoop on campus to a full on center, however this would take several months if not years to complete.

The evaluation of these programs would most effectively be discovered via an indirect survey of student sentiments as the changes progress. Instead of sending out online surveys asking specifically about depression, these surveys would instead test for levels of stress, comfort, happiness, etc as time wore on and the changes came into effect. As these descriptions generally are not paired with the conditions of depression and students are more likely to state how they are feeling than identify themselves with a certain condition, this will definitely prove the best way to evaluate the efficacy of the intervention.