Mission, Confidentiality, Anti-Bias Statement

Mission Statement

The mission of Counseling and Psychological Services (CAPS) is to provide students with mental health services that allow them to improve and maintain their mental well-being and to meet their educational, personal, emotional and spiritual goals.  Our goal is to assist students’ learning by helping manage psychological symptoms and stressors, difficult life events and mental health crises. CAPS accomplishes this with high-quality, assessment, counseling, referral, consultation, outreach and training in order to assist students in reaching their full potential.

Confidentiality Statement

Clients have a legal right to privacy and can expect your contact with us to be kept private. Written permission must be obtained before CAPS will release information with limited legal and ethical exceptions. Psychological records are maintained separately from other University records.

Goals Guiding Our Work

  • Provide professional psychological services to enrolled students, including: individual, couples and group counseling, crisis response, consultation, brief assessment, and referrals
  • Provide referrals for students who may have concerns that are not within CAPS scope of practice or problems that may be chronic or severe in nature and  require comprehensive services
  • Encourage reflection, self-awareness, personal and social responsibility, and healthy interpersonal relationships
  • Ensure confidentiality and privacy as mandated by state and federal laws
  • Provide prevention programming and consultation to students, faculty, staff, and families
  • Ensure that all services are consistent with evidence informed practice and relevant professional organizations.
  • Maintain collaborative relationships with campus stakeholders, key community partners, the surrounding community.
  • Provide continued professional development support allowing staff psychologists to maintain California State License and to stay abreast of cutting edge research related to the evolving needs of college students.
  • Train future psychologists in a brief, evidence-informed, interculturally focused treatment model that is directly applicable to a diverse college counseling.
  • Maintain commitment to a post-doctoral fellowship program and an American Psychological Association accredited intern program in  Health Service Psychology
  • Promote self-care and the maintenance of a work-life balance

Anti-Bias Statement and Commitment to Diversity

At Counseling and Psychological Services (CAPS), we believe in the diversity of thoughts, ideas and experiences, inclusive of race/ethnicity, color, gender, socioeconomic status, sexual orientation, language, national origin, religion, age, and intersecting identities. We affirm our commitment to recognize and address bias and oppression. We assist students by providing culturally sensitive mental health services and educational outreach that challenges oppressive and unjust forces, and work to reduce injustice both within the university and the broader community. 

In addition to supporting these principles of diversity and inclusion, we recognize structural inequalities in society result in the differential access and distribution of power (economic, political, social, and cultural). We believe in the elimination of structural inequities and the establishment of policies that ensure equity and accountability for all.

We acknowledge that regardless of one’s own identities, individuals are at various points along a cultural awareness journey. We also understand that bias can be unconscious or unintentional and that inequity is the combination of social and institutional power plus prejudice. Oppression does not automatically mean that those involved intended negative impact, but having these conversations is necessary and requires courage, respect, compassion, and a willingness to tolerate discomfort.  As we aim to become an unbiased center and culturally inclusive we:

  • Aim to identify, discuss, and challenge issues of injustice and the impact it has upon each of us
  • Challenge ourselves to understand and correct inequities in order to be more purposeful in this process
  • Explicitly and Publicly affirm our identity as an anti-bias university entity
  • Develop and Work to implement strategies that dismantle bias within all aspects of our department, university, and society

"I resolutely believe that respect for diversity is a fundamental pillar in the eradication of racism, xenophobia, and intolerance. There is no excuse for evading the responsibility of finding the most suitable path towards the elimination of any expression of discrimination against indigenous peoples." 
—Rigoberta Menchu, Nobel Peace Prize winner who dedicated her life to raising awareness on the plight of Guatemala's indigenous population