UC San Diego Launches Innovative Wellness App to Support Student Well-Being

Facing the Rising Tide of Mental Health Challenges

Globally, universities are seeing significant increases in mental health related incidents, and increased demand for access to wellness and mental health support, says Ed Junkins, MD, UC San Diego’s executive director of Student Health and Well-Being. While UC San Diego offers a bevy of wellness resources across its vast campus, many students are unclear about the specific resources and how to access them. To address this need, the university has sought to raise awareness for all levels of care, from screening to acute, ongoing and specialty treatment.

“All students pay for mental health services as part of their tuition and our on-campus counseling is free, yet only 10 percent of our 43,000 students use our counseling services,” said Junkins. “We know demand is increasing, and we also know that we need to make it easier for students to access these services easily, and in a way that is tailored to their unique, personal needs.”

In thinking about how to design the app, the Willo team considered building an aggregator that simply presented the university’s wellness offerings. Like a library with shelves of books cataloged to be easy to find, the app would use a similar approach by presenting users with options, helping them decide what to “check out.”

But the team quickly realized that the app needed to do more — it had to actually guide the user and act more like a librarian, asking detailed questions to get to the heart of the issue then making customized recommendations.

“Today's generation is very tuned into self-help resources they can drive and customize,” Junkins shared. “It’s that idea of having what you want, when and how you want it. Mental health and well-being resources are no different.”

Building Human-Centered AI For Students, By Students

Through extensive research, Willo’s designers learned exactly what students wanted in a wellness app. It was developed through what Manas Bedmutha, one of the student designers, calls human-centered AI.

“Our team defined what the user needs or wants, first, rather than building out the technology and then figuring out if people like it,” shared Bedmutha, a third-year PhD student at the Human-centered eXtended Intelligence research lab.

And because he and the rest of the team listened to students’ explicit input, they eventually came up with the idea to build a wellness ecosystem for all students — a place that shows everything wellness-related on campus, whether that’s Counseling and Psychological Services (CAPS), a Recreation Activity Pass, Craft Center classes and workshops, peer counseling or student-centered, identity-based communities.

“Well-being is about balance across a continuum of interconnected factors,” said Annika Nelson, M.A., manager of UC San Diego’s Craft Center. “The creative process—decompressing and making art—can induce a calming, almost meditative effect, which in turn, reduces stress. Through Willo, students can access all of the resources, including the space to create art, find balance and express themselves, across that continuum.”

"Wellness has different types and forms,” Bedmutha said. “It can be about your academic and personal growth, it can be about your mental and physical state, or it can be about your sense of social belonging.”

Inside the App

So how exactly does the app work?

Students sign in to the app using their campus login credentials and can connect their account to their MyStudentChart, UC San Diego Health’s patient portal. The student then personalizes their experience by identifying specific areas of wellness they’d like to explore from a list of categories — or “tags” — which include: mental health, physical health, academic, basic needs, arts and culture, career, communities and spirituality.

Services are pulled in real-time using a direct interface to the systems in which they’re housed. The recommendation engine offers the user resources that match those interests. Over time, Willo monitors likes, shares and time spent on certain resources to understand users' interests better and offer more nuanced selections. Users also can search for resources in the app and explore by category.

The team did an extensive amount of tagging to capture the full spectrum of each resource. According to Bedmutha, this means that the term “CAPS” could mean “mental health” or it could also mean something else is not working out in your life, like feeling stressed or isolated.

“The extensive tagging we did is the secret sauce to the app producing the best, most customized recommendation,” he said.

The Future of Willo

Willo has been a passion project for many and one that will continue to evolve after the app’s initial release.

For Kyla Bruhn, a second-year student majoring in human developmental sciences and a member of the water polo team, the opportunity to work as a junior UI/UX designer for Willo is incredibly rewarding.

“As an incoming freshman last year, I wish I'd had Willo,” she said. “This app has everything a student could want to find about wellness resources across the entire university. It opens a lot of doors, helping us start conversations and ease stress and concerns in ways that students prefer. This app is going to help a lot of people.”

Future versions of the app are expected to offer more nuanced suggestions, connecting key moments throughout the year like commencement, spring break or midterms to guide users toward different resources — some of which they may not know they need. Push notifications and the ability to view scheduled appointments or register for recreation classes may also be on the horizon.

“I've been testing for bugs these past few months and the app is only going to get better,” Bruhn revealed. “I'm really happy with what's in store.”

“A lot of work and input was put into this app,” Junkins added. “We're hoping to achieve an overall improved level of student health and wellness. If things go as we predict, this app will impact a lot of people across the entire community.”

Willo is available for students to download free of charge in the Google Play store and Apple’s App Store.