When the walk-in counselling program was first introduced at Envision Counselling and Support Centre in 2019, it was met with enthusiasm and near instant success. In the years since, they've seen so much demand for the program that they're having to make adjustments to keep up.

Envision released a statement today saying they were moving to a rapid access counselling format starting this month. The idea was to promote free, immediate, accessible, and relatively quick sessions to follow up the success of the walk-in program. 

"COVID actually brought a lot of things to light for us as a collaborative," said Envision's executive director Christa Daku. "We often communicate as a partnership throughout the province on what might be best to serve the people."

There are 11 counselling organizations throughout the province that often talk with one another about the challenges they face, and the pandemic has certainly given them plenty of things to talk about as they adapt. One thing they collectively learned was that walk-in counselling, already popular, was getting even more so. As such, they set up a website, https://www.counsellingconnectsask.ca/, to help promote virtual sessions. 

“We discovered during the pandemic that individuals can thrive through remote appointments as well as in-person Walk-In Counselling,” says Daku. “Thanks to our partnership with Family Services Saskatchewan and other agencies providing the same service, we were able to improve accessibility province-wide and make this website a reality.”

Envision and their partners intend for this service to be helpful to people struggling with stress, depression, anxiety, family conflict and urgent needs. As the demand for their services spiked over the course of the pandemic, they learned how important it would be for them to adapt in order to keep up with that demand. 

"The biggest difference, I think," said Daku, "and again, COVID really influenced this when we went to virtual services, we're no longer just doing walk-in counselling. All of our service providers throughout the province are doing virtual options as well. So we've purchased an online platform where anyone in the province can go online and book a session with one of our councilors."

You can book an appointment on this website up to 48 hours in advance. According to Daku, virtual services mean you can also choose to see someone in a different centre if councilors in Estevan and Weyburn are all booked up.