Assistant Director of the Counseling Center Featured in Counseling Today Magazine

Lion statue in front of a bricked building. It is in the evening and the focus is on the lion.

By Julia Gessner and Sara Wray

A recent issue of Counseling Today included a cover article titled “Coping with College” that featured comments by Texas A&M University-Commerce Assistant Director of the Counseling Center, Nick Patras.

Patras was one of six counselors to be featured in the article. Counseling Today reaches an audience of over 56,000 ACA members along with many other online readers. The article discussed the importance of counseling college students and how it can help them in their personal lives and academic careers.

“National surveys conducted by the American College Counseling Association (ACCA), a division of the American Counseling Association, indicated that the percentage of students struggling with serious mental illness has increased,” stated senior writer for Counseling Today, Laurie Meyers.

Patras holds a Master of Science in Community Counseling from A&M-Commerce and is currently a doctoral candidate in Counselor Education and Supervision at A&M-Commerce. In addition to being a counselor and assistant director of the Counseling Center, Patras also serves as co-chair of the Safe Spaces Ally Project and supervises master's level interns working in the Counseling Center.

“So much of what we do in the Counseling Center is to teach students emotional regulation and simple relaxation techniques such as mindfulness meditation and proper breathing to ease anxiety symptoms,” said Patras. “Reducing stress and anxiety allows a student to focus on time management and goal completion.”

To read the article in Counseling Today, visit here. The Counseling Center on campus is located on the second floor of the Halladay Student Services building across from the Amphitheater. To learn more about the Counseling Center visit, www.tamuc.edu/counselingcenter.