BLACKSBURG, Va. – A crisis on college campuses around the country.

A new Wiley research study published this year shows more than 80% of college students say they’re struggling emotionally.

When Jilly Riccio was in high school, she lost her close friend Jamison Novello in a way she never imagined.

“One of my friends died by suicide. That’s why it struck a chord and stuck with me, and that’s why I’ve been so passionate about it.”

During that time, Riccio was a part of her school’s SAFE Club — a way to talk openly about suicide, and mental health. But when she got to Virginia Tech, she quickly realized there was nothing close to that on campus.

Spring of last year, she decided to take matter’s into her own hands, creating the SAFE Club at Virginia Tech.

“It’s been really successful, and almost like therapy for me,” Riccio said.

10 News sat down with students at Virginia Tech to see how the mental health crisis impacts them.

Junior Jackie Mitchell said she wasn’t aware of the extent of her mental health problems until college.

“My mom was just like, ‘Oh you just have the jitters,’ but I came to Virginia Tech and was like, ‘I’m going to try therapy since it’s a free option,’ and they said, ‘You have anxiety,’” Mitchell said.

As Jackie told 10 News, anxiety for her wasn’t just ‘the jitters.’

“My body would physically shut down,” she said.

Abby Conner is the Communications Chair for the Clear Minds Project at Virginia Tech.

She said she hears students say time and time again, they feel alone.

“Some people are like, ‘Oh my issue isn’t that big,’ but to you, it is. It’s the biggest thing going on in your life,” Conner said.

Conner, her friend Aiden Williams, along with other students on campus created the Clear Minds Project this semester to bring awareness to resources for mental health, as well as help students navigate them.

“Mental health stuff especially, the insurance is terrible in Virginia, so it’s really complicated. Any information we can provide about that, we’re trying to do,” Williams said.

The Clear Minds Project, along with the SAFE Club, are just some of the resources for struggling students.

They appreciate and support the counseling efforts from Virginia Tech, but tell us they recognize how important community with other students is for healing.

“When you hear a student that has gone through something similar as you or can relate to you, because then you really do feel less alone. When you realize there’s a club, there’s a whole community where you can go to and you don’t even really have to say anything, you just have them there, I think that’s so important,” Riccio said.

Former San Diego State forward Elijah Saunders has committed to Tony Bennett and the Univeristy of Virginia, he told On3.

The 6-foot-8 sophomore from Phoenix also closely considered Clemson and Washington. He averaged 6.2 points and 3.6 rebounds per game this season.

According to the On3 Industry Ranking, Saunders is a former three-star recruit and was the No. 179 overall player in the nation from the 20 cycle. The On3 Industry Ranking is a weighted average that utilizes all four major recruiting media companies.

Elijah Saunders commits to Virginia, transfer portal background information

The NCAA Transfer Portal, which covers every NCAA sport at the Division I, II and III levels, is a private database with names of student-athletes who wish to transfer. It is not accessible to the public.

The process of entering the portal is done through a school’s compliance office. Once a player provides written notification of an intent to transfer, the office enters the player’s name in the database and everything is off and running. The compliance office has 48 hours to comply with the player’s request and that request cannot be refused.

Once a player’s name shows up in the portal, other schools can contact the player. Players can change their minds at any point and withdraw from the portal. However, once a player enters the portal, the current scholarship no longer has to be honored. In other words, if a player enters the portal but decides to stay, the school is not obligated to provide a scholarship anymore.

The database is a normal database, sortable by a variety of topics, including (of course) sport and name. A player’s individual entry includes basic details such asynchronous contact info, whether the player was on scholarship and whether the player is transferring as a graduate student.

A player can ask that a “do not contact” tag be placed on the report. In those instances, the players don’t want to be contacted by schools unless they’ve initiated the communication.

Track transfer portal activity

While the NCAA Transfer Portal database is private, the On3 Network has streamlined the reporting process tracking player movement. If you find yourself asking, ‘How can I track transfer portal activity?’ our well-established network of reporters and contacts across college athletics keeps you up to speed in several ways, from articles written about players as they enter and exit the transfer portal or find their new destination, to our social media channels, to the On3 Transfer Portal.

The transfer portal wire provides a real-time feed of player activity, including basic player profile information, transfer portal ranking and original On3 Industry recruiting ranking, as well as NIL valuation (name, image and likeness).

The On3 Transfer Portal Rankings allow for you to filter the On3 Industry Rankings to find the best of the best in the portal, starting with Overall Top Players. 

The On3 Transfer Portal Instagram account and Twitter account are excellent resources to stay up to date with the latest moves.

Twenty-five people were arrested Saturday for trespassing at the University of Virginia after police clashed with pro-Palestinian protesters who refused to remove tents from campus, and demonstrators at the University of Michigan chanted anti-war messages and waved flags during commencement ceremonies.

In Virginia, student demonstrators began their protest on a lawn outside the school chapel Tuesday. On Saturday, video from WVAW-TV showed police wearing heavy gear and holding shields lined up on the campus in Charlottesville. Protesters chanted “Free Palestine,” and university police said on the social platform X that an “unlawful assembly” had been declared in the area.

As police moved in, students were pushed to the ground, pulled by their arms and sprayed with a chemical irritant, Laura Goldblatt, an assistant professor of English and global studies who has been helping student demonstrators, told The Washington Post.

“Our concern since this began has been the safety of our students. Students are not safe right now,” Goldblatt said.

The university administration said in a statement that the demonstrators were told the tents and canopies they erected were prohibited under school policy and were asked to remove them. Virginia State Police were asked to help with enforcement, the university said.

It was the latest clash in several tense and sometimes violent weeks at colleges and universities around the country that have seen dozens of protests and hundreds of arrests at demonstrations over the ongoing Israel-Hamas war.

Tent encampments of protesters calling on universities to stop doing business with Israel or companies they say support the war in Gaza have spread across campuses nationwide in a student movement unlike any other this century. Some schools have reached agreements with protesters to end the demonstrations and reduce the possibility of disrupting final exams and commencements.

The Associated Press has recorded at least 61 incidents since April 18 in which arrests were made at protests, with more than 2,400 people being arrested on 47 campuses. The figures are based on AP reporting and statements from universities and law enforcement agencies.

Many encampments have been dismantled.

Michigan was among the schools bracing for protests during commencement this weekend, including Indiana University, Ohio State University and Northeastern University in Boston. Many more are slated in the coming weeks.

In Ann Arbor, the protest happened at the beginning of the event at Michigan Stadium. About 75 people, many wearing traditional Arabic kaffiyehs along with their graduation caps, marched up the main aisle toward the graduation stage.

They chanted “Regents, regents, you can’t hide! You are funding genocide!” while holding signs, including one that read: “No universities left in Gaza.”

Overhead, planes flew banners with competing messages. “Divest from Israel now! Free Palestine!” and “We stand with Israel. Jewish lives matter.”

Officials said no one was arrested, and the protest didn’t seriously interrupt the nearly two-hour event, which was attended by tens of thousands of people, some of them waving Israeli flags.

State police prevented the demonstrators from reaching the stage and university spokesperson Colleen Mastony said public safety personnel escorted the protesters to the rear of the stadium, where they remained through the conclusion of the event.

“Peaceful protests like this have taken place at U-M commencement ceremonies for decades,” she added.

The university has allowed protesters to set up an encampment on campus, but police assisted in breaking up a large gathering at a graduation-related event Friday night, and one person was arrested.

At Indiana, protesters were urging supporters to wear their kaffiyehs and walk out during remarks by President Pamela Whitten on Saturday evening. The Bloomington campus designated a protest zone outside Memorial Stadium, the arena for the ceremony.

At Princeton, in New Jersey, 18 students launched a hunger strike in an effort to push the university to divest from companies tied to Israel.

One of them, senior David Chmielewski said in an email that the strike started Friday morning with participants consuming water only, and it will continue until administrators meet with students about demands including amnesty from criminal and disciplinary charges for protesters.

Other demonstrators are participating in “solidarity fasts” lasting 24 hours, Chmielewski said.

Princeton students set up a protest encampment and some held a sit-in at an administrative building this week, leading to about 15 arrests.

Students at other colleges, including Brown and Yale, launched similar hunger strikes earlier this year before the more recent wave of encampments.

Meanwhile in Medford, Massachusetts, students at Tufts University peacefully took down their encampment without police intervention Friday night.

School officials said they were pleased with the development, which wasn’t the result of any agreement. Protest organizers said in a statement that they were “deeply angered and disappointed” that negotiations with the university had failed.

The protests stem from the conflict that started Oct. 7 when Hamas militants attacked southern Israel, killing about 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and taking roughly 250 hostages.

Vowing to destroy Hamas, Israel launched an offensive in Gaza that has killed more than 34,500 Palestinians, around two-thirds of them women and children, according to the Health Ministry in the Hamas-ruled territory. Israeli strikes have devastated the enclave and displaced most of its inhabitants.

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Marcelo reported from New York. Lavoie reported from Richmond, Virginia. Associated Press reporters Ed White in Detroit, Nick Perry in Boston and Adrian Sainz in Memphis, Tennessee, contributed.