Last year, I wrote an article for the Pope Center questioning whether UNC students need to pay health fees if they are all covered by “Gold” health plans.
Now, it looks like university health administrators are getting ready to fight back. At a meeting of the Southern College Health Association in early March, one of the sessions was entitled “Director’s Roundtable: Are We Ready to Defend College Health?”. Both of the presenters were from UNC schools.
Abstract: In the past few years there have been multiple requests on the listserv for help with a response to the question why do we need a health fee if the students have health insurance, or why do we need a health center at all? Rather than have everyone work in a vacuum let’s see if we can work together to create a draft response that can be tailored to each campus’ needs After this session, attendees should be able to: 1. List three common questions administration may ask about what the Student Health Center contributes to campus. 2. Discuss response options that directors can use to respond to requests for information. Presenter(s): Katrin Wesner, MS, CAPPM (Director, Student Health Center, UNC-Wilmington) and David Rousmaniere, MBA (Director, Student Health Center, UNC-Charlotte)
College health administrators are right to be concerned. In this age of rising costs, every expense must be scrutinized. And it’s not clear that campus health centers are delivering much value to students.
