Essential Information for First-Year Students
Rice students often request help at the Counseling Center when they are:
- Feeling overwhelmed with academic and/or personal pressures or worries...
- Troubled by problems in a dating relationship...
- Bothered by lack of motivation to study, practice, or complete a thesis or dissertation...
- Struggling with symptoms of depression or anxiety...
- Trying to cope with a personal crisis such as the death of a family member or friend, other significant losses, or a major life change.
The Rice Counseling Center is your campus resource for addressing these and other personal, social, and emotional concerns.
Eligibility for Services
Currently enrolled undergraduate or graduate students who have paid the Student Health fee.
Free, Confidential Services Provided
- Initial assessment
- Short-term individual, couples, and group counseling and psychotherapy, if appropriate. Counseling sessions are provided by the Center's psychologists, licensed professional counselor and interns
- Crisis counseling (for an urgent problem)
- Psychiatric consultations and medication management by the Center's consulting psychiatrist, if appropriate
- Consultation services (regarding a friend, question about a psychological issue, off-campus referrals, etc.)
- Workshops, educational materials, peer educator program ("CAPP")
- Assistance with finding off-campus referrals for students who need long-term, intensive and/or specialized care not provided by Center staff
Location, Hours, and Contact
- Lovett Hall, Entrance A, Third Floor
- 8:30-Noon, 1-5 p.m., Monday-Friday, year-round
- (713) 348-4867; rucc@rice.edu
Continuity of Care: Finding Off-Campus Resources
Although Houston is a large city with numerous, excellent medical resources, waiting lists are not unusual for psychiatrists. Students who enter Rice with a mental health concern that requires on-going care should make arrangements before the start of the school year to locate Houston mental health professionals who can provide that continuity of care. Rice Counseling Center staff can assist you with that process, if you wish.
It is the policy of the Counseling Center that our psychiatric services are adjunctive to the counseling and psychotherapy services provided by the staff counselors. Anyone needing psychiatric services and who is not engaged in therapy at the Rice Counseling Center is referred off-campus for these services.