Maryville College Counseling Center prepares ‘Bridges to Wellbeing’ project with the help of state Opioid Abatement Grant
Nov. 5, 2025
Maryville College has been awarded a half-million dollar community grant from the State of Tennessee’s Opioid Abatement Council Community Grants program that will go toward a prevention program for students called “Bridges to Wellbeing.”
Designed by Claudia Werner and Emily Dobias of the Maryville College Counseling Center, Bridges to Wellbeing is “a more individualistic plan for students where they can choose what they feel will work best for them,” Werner said.
“The Counseling Center and our internal/external partners will provide a menu of choices to help each student find their own path to manage the stress of college (and in life) and the challenges that come with it while decreasing the reliance on unhealthy choices to ‘survive’ through college,” added Werner, the center’s director. “We want all our students to have the ability to focus on their best life while they are here and use this knowledge as a stepping stone to their future lives.”
Harm reduction through settlement money
The community grant, which totals $561,172 over a three-year period from January 2026 through December 2028, was secured by Amy White, director of grant development at Maryville College. The Tennessee Opioid Abatement Council was established by the Tennessee General Assembly as a way to determine the best ways to spend money received from lawsuits related to the opioid crisis, a public health emergency that began in the 1990s with aggressively marketed prescription narcotics that eventually led to record overdose numbers. Nationwide, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 105,000 Americans died from drug overdoses in 2023, and 76% of those were due to opioids.
The first round of grants from the council was awarded in 2024, and White applied on behalf of the College when round two applications were opened, she said, as a way to continue the prevention education work the MC Counseling Center started with a $306,000 grant received in 2021 from the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) that ended in 2024.
“Knowing that more funds were needed to both support the prevention education work the Counseling Center was doing under the grant, knowing that funds were needed to support the counseling and mental health support services that students need on campus, I worked with Claudia and Ben Stubbs (vice president and dean of students at MC) to see if this could be an opportunity for the Counseling Center to apply for funding under the ‘primary prevention’ category,” White said. “We wanted to develop a strategic approach for prevention education with evidence-based strategies to ensure that our college students are resilient and can learn the coping skills needed to deal with stress and challenges and avoid future substance abuse.”
“Our philosophy is an upstream approach, meaning we focus on the root causes of mental health and addiction issues rather than treating the problems after they occur,” Werner added. “The Counseling Center focuses on giving students the tools to help themselves with any challenges that they have while at Maryville College.”
While the community grant awards have been announced, state of Tennessee officials are currently drafting contracts for those awarded funds under the Tennessee Opioid Abatement Council Round Two of community grants, White said. State and College officials will then review the terms of the contract, make any needed revisions, and finalize it before the Jan. 1, 2026, start date.
White’s request for Bridges to Wellbeing was funded in full, she noted, meaning that MC will receive $187,057.44 per year through the end of 2028. The new funding, Werner said, will provide an additional staff member trained in addiction and recovery support. This individual will work alongside Werner and Dobias, who serves as the counseling center’s First Steps coordinator, and provide workshops, training and other materials to educate and support Scots during their four years at Maryville College.
“We will likely add another peer support group geared to addiction, such as an all-recovery group,” Werner said. “The Counseling Center will utilize trauma-informed care strategies in everything we do. We will also provide trauma-informed care and prevention education training for faculty and staff.
“We have so many more ideas on how to use this funding to help students find their path to wellbeing and hopefully prevent the rise in substance use, especially opioids.”
Addressing mental health concerns
Because the College applied for a “primary prevention” community grant, White added, the money will be spent on prevention strategies and programs that address many of the stressors and mental health challenges that could play a role in substance abuse, if unaddressed. Mental health concerns are on the rise, Werner said, and every college has some students who struggle with substance use and addiction.
“We typically see the most volume at the beginning of the academic year, as we have so many new students getting adjusted to college,” Werner said. “The Counseling Center has seen anywhere from 8% to 16% of the student population over the past five academic years.”
According to Counseling Center records, anxiety and stress are the top issues facing Scots who seek out the center’s services, Werner pointed out. Depression and other mood problems are also common problems that push students to seek counseling, as are relationship issues, loneliness and socialization challenges.
“All of these factors can lead to substance use at some level,” Werner said. “College students typically underreport their use and are less likely to seek help with it.”
The idea behind Bridges to Wellbeing is to not only strengthen prevention programs, but to dismantle the stigma associated with not only substance abuse, but mental health care in general. The 2021 grant funds gave the Counseling Center much-needed resources to push back on that stigma through workshops and on-campus training sessions for faculty, staff and students, while maintaining individual counseling and drop-in sessions.
“We have worked hard to reduce the stigma of utilizing counseling services,” Werner said. “This experience with our new ‘Bridges to Wellbeing’ program, funded by the State of Tennessee Opioid Abatement Council community grant, will be very helpful in continuing our journey to help students thrive here at Maryville College and utilize the Opioid Abatement grant funds in an effective, helpful way.”