Sitting in her dorm room alone on a Sunday night four years ago, freshman international student Ana Reyna sighed as she reflected on the cherished moments spent with her family and friends back home in Mexico.

Alone she sat, hundreds of miles away from the comfort of her homeland as she navigated a new chapter of her life at SMU. She was obligated to find a new family outside of hers in Mexico. It took her a year and a half to truly adapt on campus.

Today, after almost two years of counseling and joining campus clubs, Reyna found her new home at SMU.

“You make your own family here,” said Reyna, program coordinator for the International Student & Scholar Services (ISSS) and SMU alumna. “You might live through that homesickness and be like a bittersweet being excited to be here, happy to make new friends, but also missing back home.”

Reyna said the ISSS was an important program that made such a positive impact on her mental wellness that she started working for it in college part-time and now works for it full-time.

While international students are excited to pursue an American education for its unmatched opportunities, homesickness is a significant factor that can affect their mental health.

ISSS aims to help international students adjust culturally, socially and academically, overcome homesickness, and find a new home in their SMU community.

There were 1,007 international students enrolled at SMU in the fall of 2023, which is 8.5% of the total enrollment, according to the SMU Campus Profile. Reyna was once one of those students.

Reyna hails from Mexico and learned English at an international school in Switzerland. She struggled to affiliate herself with the SMU culture during her freshman year. Still, in an attempt to find a sense of community, Reyna joined clubs, went to on-campus events, and worked with counseling services to overcome the cultural transition.

SMU Counseling Services provides support to students struggling to stay well mentally. Working with counseling services was new to Reyna as mental health was not talked about in Hispanic culture.
Yet amid these tribulations, Reyna was able to adapt to her new home on the Hilltop and now shares her story of her journey to find community in order to connect with current international students to help them battle the challenges of adjusting to a new environment.

SMU Counseling Services & the ISSS support International students

SMU Counseling Services provides a safe space for students to talk about how college life has impacted them mentally, Yu Harumi, a licensed psychologist for SMU’s Counseling Services explained.

“We are here to provide services that can be helpful to students’ success in college, whether it be success in an academic sense, or social or career or in whatever way,” Harumi said.

Reyna was among one of the approximately one million international students who attend universities across the U.S. In a study published in 2021, researchers concluded that 27.4% of international students experienced major depressive disorder, while 20% experienced generalized anxiety disorder. Additionally, 26.4% of the students studied had an eating disorder, 17.2% engaged in non-suicidal self-injury and 8.8% experienced suicidal ideation. Overall, the findings revealed that around half of international students attending U.S. universities were found to have one or more of these mental health disorders.

Ultimately, international students experience more mental health issues than domestic students, according to a 2021 National Library of Medicine study The study found that international students experienced more depressive symptoms, higher stress levels and lower social support compared to domestic students.

ISSS prides itself in immersing international students in American culture while maintaining connections with the student’s roots, Reyna explained.

“We listen to what students want and what they are excited about,” she said. “Most of our programs are to, one, celebrate their own culture, but also immerse them in the Texan and American culture.”

ISSS also plans events where international students can build connections with domestic students, Reyna said. For example, the office hosted an event where they played a popular movie in the Indian culture that drew a crowd of domestic students as well.

“They were singing the songs of the movie and everything,” Reyna said. “[Domestic students] can become more open-minded and get to see other parts of SMU that familiarize themselves with international students.”

International students struggle to adapt

While ISSS works to connect international and domestic students, Reyna said that students are naturally drawn to people similar to them because of their familiarity.

“It’s human nature that you go to people that are most like you, because you feel familiar with it,” Reyna said. “When I arrived, my freshman year, my first friends were all Latinos, they’re all from Central America, because they had had a similar childhood to mine.”

Carly Belotti, an SMU student from Australia, said she struggled with cultural adjustment as an international student.

“Although both countries are similar in a lot of ways, I experienced more of a culture shock than I anticipated,” Belotti said.

Cultural traditions in America such as football and Greek life, as well as other popular slang terms and societal norms, didn’t exist in Australia, Belotti said.

“The best way for me to adjust to these changes was to just fully immerse myself into all aspects,” Belotti said. “Along with this, finding people I clicked with ultimately allowed me to feel like I was at home in this new country.”

It’s not uncommon for colleges in the U.S. to offer mental health counseling for international students, but it’s worth noting that not every university offers it. As a remedy for this deficit, Joy Mental Fitness is an organization that provides in-person and virtual counseling for international students in New Jersey, Massachusetts, Connecticut and New York. The organization supports all students, whether they struggle with academics, cultural adjustment, loneliness or well-being. Students seeking their services can book an appointment online or call one of the available counselors.

Why are international students still struggling with seeking help?

One of the biggest limitations to the well-being of many international students is awareness. Many of are unaware of SMU’s available counseling services, and lack familiarity with mental health topics, Harumi said. Moreover, some are also unaware of the confidentiality of therapy.

“In some cultures, I know that mental health is not viewed as a thing,” Harumi said. “And even if they do, the idea of talking to someone outside of their family, friends, community of any sort, and talking to a stranger like me, that might be something that is very foreign.”

International students might also have unrealistic expectations of therapy, Harumi explained.

“They might think of us like a doctor who can cure whatever they’re dealing with in just one appointment of a limited number of appointments. Mental health issues tend to be more complicated than that.”

International students are less likely than domestic students to turn to counseling for help, according to a 2021 Purdue study. The study found that 32% of international students reported the use of counseling services compared to 49.8% of domestic students.

Mental health is important to talk about especially since some cultures have different perspectives on it, Reyna said. Mental health counseling was not talked about in Mexico, she said.

“It’s a very religious country,” she said. “They’ll just tell me, ‘you should pray about it.’”

With the help of SMU Counseling Services, a free resource for all SMU students, Reyna has built relationships beyond her Mexican roots and now calls SMU a second home.

“I feel like there has definitely been improvement every day. Students feel like this is more their home,” Reyna said. “Sometimes, like just going out on vacation, and then coming back to Dallas makes them feel like ‘Oh, I’m back home.’”