Past midnight each morning, a pair of Texas A&M students wait in an apartment-like space with a kitchen of mismatched pots and pans.
When it's quiet, they play board games such as Scrabble or do homework to pass time.
But when the phone rings, they're ready.
Some calls are easy, like when students vent about teachers, seek phone numbers or ask about the Howdy portal. One of many information-packed binders does the trick.
Then there are others.
Freshmen feeling overwhelmed. International students lonely in a new world. Aggies tackling alcohol, pregnancy and relationship issues, or mulling suicide.
That's when human compassion meets the intensive training learned by the 40 or so Texas A&M students who volunteer to man the Helpline.
"These four years are so tumultuous," said Paige Castelino, a student volunteer and biology major. "We go through things no other category of people go through. They're away from home, figuring out themselves. Sometimes you just want to have people listen to you, to be there for you."
The phone number for Helpline -- run by Student Counseling Service, within the student affairs division, since 1995 -- is listed on every Aggie's student ID card, a gentle reassurance of a helping hand a call away.
Now, Helpline student volunteers are reaching out for help.
Cuts loom
The hot line faces a reduction of 40 percent of its roughly $150,000 yearly budget.
The program will cut two paid graduate assistant positions, eliminate stipends for five professional psychologists who provide backup assistance on the more serious calls and reduce the operating budget by up to $10,000.
It's a tale of stretching resources, one playing out across campus.
Maggie Gartner, director of Student Counseling Service, said she is working to find other spots within the university for the graduate assistants.
She also said that professional staff could begin to provide the backup assistance as part of their job duties. The details are under discussion.
"Carrying a pager after hours is always a burden, and I will try to make that as painless as I can for my staff," she wrote in an e-mail.
Four pre-doctoral interns already on the SCS staff would fulfill the duties of the graduate assistants, who helped supervise the student volunteers.
The student volunteers and Texas A&M students, she said, should notice little effect on the daily operation of Helpline since the cuts are "behind the scenes."
"The quality and quantity of Helpline services will remain at the same high level that it has always been," she said.
It remains to be seen if that's possible in the long-term, said some of the student volunteers, who typically work at least a four- to six-hour shift each week.
"I want to confidently say, 'I provided the best quality of mental health services to our callers,'" said Dustin Grabsch, a student volunteer, in an e-mail. "For me to say that, it requires adequate and sufficient funding for training, recruitment, and retention of my fine colleagues."
Bracing for a cut
The state-mandated budget reduction of 5 percent amounts to $28 million at Texas A&M over the two-year period that began Sept. 1.
Officials have said protecting teaching, research and service is the priority, so non-academic programs would absorb a larger share of the cuts.
Student Counseling Service, for instance, would slice 22 percent of the state portion of its budget, Gartner said. Texas A&M President R. Bowen Loftin has said the academic colleges have been asked to make reductions roughly in the 2 percent range, though each college was given a different target.
With most of the university's expenses tied up in salaries and benefits, eliminating positions and not filling vacant ones is a large chunk of the reduction strategy.
State leaders in January ordered all agencies and higher-education institutions to plan for the reduction, which isn't final yet.
In a time-strapped process that some, including Faculty Senate Speaker Robert Bednarz, said left little time for creativity, the university had a month to submit plans.
The Legislative Budget Board and state leaders will review plans before deciding the next step, a spokeswoman for Gov. Rick Perry said.
Spending cuts will have to come from somewhere. Texas balanced its budget last year, but barely. Now, the state won't have the $12 billion stimulus funding it used to do so, and sales-tax revenue also is expected to be lower.
Connecting
Helpline operates from 4 p.m. to 8 a.m. weekdays, and 24 hours on weekends, all the hours that Student Counseling Service is not open.
"One reason they're dialing us is they have no one to talk to," Grabsch said. "A lot of institutions don't offer this service. That's what makes us unique. It gives us 24-hour access to mental health."
Student volunteers also tout the skills the program teaches, such as listening and helping those in need, along with the camaraderie that develops among the partners.
They are considering writing a letter to Loftin. The president has instructed that no cuts be made to the police department because that would affect physical health and safety.
"Mental health should also be considered," said Alex McQuade, a volunteer and business management major.
He said the students want to figure out long-term funding. One option under consideration is creating an endowment.
In a world with instant access to social networking sites, e-mail and text-messaging, reaching out and talking to someone remains as important as ever, McQuade said.
"I think there's a connection you make when you're verbally talking that you can't make through words on a screen," he said. "There's expression and feelings through voice. There are definitely benefits to how wired we are, but at the same time, talking one-on-one with someone, there are aspects you can't replace."
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