By Tucker Reilly, News Assignment Editor
Del Rey Honeycutt has been named director of counseling services at St. Bonaventure University, a position vacated by Christopher Anderson at the end of 2020. Prior to her work at the university, Honeycutt had been the Wellness Center director at Alfred University and was an adjunct professor for Bonaventure’s graduate program in Mental Health Counseling & School Counseling.
“I started Jan. 11 here at Bona’s and the big change for me is the focus on counseling itself,” said Honeycutt. “I was the director at Alfred University’s Wellness Center, which was an integrated center of health, counseling and wellness education. I had many different staff members reporting to me and I had to balance the medical needs, especially during COVID-19 in addition to the mental health of the student body. The biggest transition has been the ability to solely focus on mental health, which is particularly useful right now.”
While many of the effects brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic have been physical, the mental and emotional aspects of personal wellbeing have also been a target. Symptoms of isolation, fears of loss and legitimate trauma provide new avenues for counselors to address in a post-pandemic landscape.
“A lot of the focus on the coronavirus has been physical, and rightly so, given all of the unknowns at the start and the tremendous harm inflicted on health and wellbeing,” said Honeycutt. “But the underlying effects on a person’s mental health were, I believe, set aside for a good portion of time, which did us a disservice. Now we’re kind of playing catch-up with what COVID-19 has done.”
A unique challenge lies in the similarities between the lives of counselors and clients.
“This is an unprecedented time,” said Honeycutt. “We’ve never really lived through a period where counselors are essentially experiencing the same things as their clients. Being able to highlight the tremendous job that counselors have done, even when they are vulnerable themselves, is essential.”
With new leadership in the university’s counseling program, the possibilities for change seem endless. Honeycutt said she has been taking note of what students want out of a counseling program on campus and some of those long-term goals branch out into physical developments.
“I listened to students, and one of the things they said is that they wanted a place where they could relax and unwind, what some of them called a ‘sensory room,’” said Honeycutt. “So we’re looking into places on campus that students could utilize,and offer things like aromatherapy and other tools to create a space for them to enjoy.”
In a Feb. 16 press release announcing Honeycutt, Vice President for Student Affairs Katie O’Brien stated, “We look forward to strengthening and expanding our counseling services under Del Rey’s leadership.” Honeycutt said she agrees with this sentiment and that her goals for the university’s counseling services involve branching out and becoming more accessible to the student population.
“I like Katie’s words of strengthening and growing, because my vision is to build a counseling center that students can be proud of,” said Honeycutt. “Individual counseling is a strength of ours, but we could grow with developing our group [counseling], as well as workshops and psychoeducational opportunities. We can also target groups like student athletes, who have had a method of coping taken away and make ourselves available in a way we haven’t been before.”
reillyt19@bonaventure.edu
