The Bicocca Counselling Service

University students during their academic career are easily confronted with several difficult situations – academic anxiety, exams avoidance, mild general anxiety or depression – directly stemming from the challenges of that life period. For a more helpful intervention, it is better to describe their difficulties as critical developmental issues rather than true psychopathological symptoms. Enhancing resilience, reduce the vulnerability sources, enabling the students to move to the adult life, is among the main goals of university counselling services. In Milano-Bicocca University (that was founded in 1998), the first counselling and tutoring service [SACSUM] was open in 2004 for medical students only. The theoretical background of the counselling intervention was cognitive-relational (Rezzonico, Meier, 2010; Strepparava, Rezzonico, 2010). In march 2009 another counselling service [CCPSU] was open for psychology student; its approach was brief psychodynamic (Adamo, Giusti, Valerio, 2003; Adamo, Fontana, Preti, Prunas, Riffaldi, Sarno, 2012). After the task-force work for the foundation of CSAS [Coordinamento dei Servizi di Ateneo per gli Studenti] in 2009, the two services began to work in a coordinated way that give rise, in 2012, to the Bicocca Counselling Service. The current structure is as follows: students from the different faculties are addressed to one of the two section (one at the school of medicine, one at the psychology department) according to criteria agreed upon by the chiefs of the two sections. Also if the two sections have different clinical background - cognitive relational and brief psychodynamic – they share the same general not-pathologizing attitude in doing the intervention, are problem-oriented, try to support the maturation of the students, helping them to identify alternative developmental routes most suited to their own personal aspirations and inclinations by focussing on the meaning of the current impasse. Counsellors are well trained (and regularly supervised) to identify at risk situations: these are addressed to the Adult Psychology Services of the Medical School Teaching Hospital for psychotherapy. The counselling cycle is short (4 to 8 sessions), and can be repeated once; the two services offer both individual and group interventions (on specific problems, as exams anxiety) according to the specificity of their approaches. The volume of clients is good and adequate to the total number of students. Satisfaction measures and intervention efficacy are routinely assessed.