In June, The Jed Foundation convened leaders from across Southeast Michigan for the Detroit Drives Degrees Community College Collaborative (D3C3) Campus Convening, hosted at the Detroit Regional Chamber. The gathering brought together a powerful group of student success champions — including campus leads, task force members, faculty, and student-facing staff — for a day rooted in reflection, learning, and shared commitment.
More than just a convening, the day created intentional space for institutions to step back, assess progress, and re-energize their efforts to center student mental health as a critical component of student success.
Reflecting on Progress, Strengthening What Works
Facilitated by Rachel Czerny and Eddy Gonzalez of The Jed Foundation, the day’s presentations focused on what it takes to sustain campus mental health initiatives over time. Participants engaged in honest conversations about both successes and challenges, highlighting meaningful accomplishments while also identifying areas where additional support, structure, and investment are still needed.
These reflections underscored an important truth: building effective mental health systems on campus is not a one-time effort. It requires continuous learning, adaptation, and collaboration.
Turning Insight into Action
A standout moment of the convening was a workshop led by the Foundation’s Jahi Gordon, which focused on practical strategies to better support the mental health of young men of color — a group that continues to face unique and often unmet needs within higher education systems.
Participants walked away with actionable approaches, including:
- Expanding early alert systems to identify students who may be struggling sooner
- Strengthening referral pathways to counseling and support services
- Increasing faculty and staff training to recognize signs of distress
- Creating intentional spaces on campus that foster connection, belonging, and community
These strategies reflect a broader shift from reactive support to proactive, systems-level change — ensuring that students are seen, supported, and connected before they reach a crisis point.
A Regional Commitment to Student Success
What made the day especially impactful was the shared understanding across institutions: prioritizing student mental health is not just a campus initiative, it is a regional strategy for workforce readiness and socioeconomic mobility.
The work happening within D3C3 demonstrates that when institutions align around common goals and shared practices, they can create scalable, lasting change. Student success, particularly for historically underserved populations, depends on systems that are equitable, responsive, and built to support the whole student.
Moving From Conversation to Culture Change
Through TalentEd at the Detroit Regional Chamber and D3C3’s Student Success Cluster, this work continues to focus on the practices that truly shift systems. Equitable academic advising, evidence-based campus mental health strategies, and the infrastructure needed to sustain them are at the center of these efforts.
And increasingly, the impact is clear.
Conversations are turning into action.
Strategies are becoming standard practice.
And across campuses and partner organizations, there is real momentum toward measurable culture change.