Staff Spotlight: Joe Cloidt
Meet Joe Cloidt, the Director of Counseling and Behavioral Health Services.
Q: How long have you been at Purchase and what is your current role here?
A: I’m starting my 15th year at SUNY Purchase. After one year as Interim Director I was named Director of Counseling and Behavioral Health Services (CBHS) on July 30, 2026.
Q: Tell us a bit about your professional background, both at Purchase and before.
A: I am a New York State Licensed Mental Health Counselor with Diagnostic Privilege. I earned a Masters of Arts in Counseling Psychology from Antioch New England in Keene, NH. My love of college counseling was birthed through an internship at the Keene State College Counseling Center. The year immediately prior to starting at SUNY Purchase I trained Department of Social Services casework supervisors and caseworkers on the use of restorative practices with families engaged with the foster care system.
Earlier in my career I spent eight years working as a counselor, trainer, and Assistant Director of Counseling at a residential treatment center with abused, neglected, and adjudicated youth in Hastings-on-Hudson. My early academic career involved majoring in English and World Literature, Peace Studies, and Religious at Manhattan College followed by a Masters in Theological Studies with a Concentration in Justice and Peace from the Maryknoll School of Theology.
Q: Tell us a bit more about your position.
A: As the Director of CBHS I have the pleasure of managing a talented, smart, caring team consisting 5 counselors, a health promotion coordinator, an administrative assistant and a part time psychiatrist. I also work closely with the other directors within student affairs and across the campus to understand the mental health needs of our students and develop effective strategies to meet the needs. I support the team both through planful clinical supervision, crisis response, and health promotion planning. I serve on multiple committees with administrators, staff, and faculty as we work to make the gem that is SUNY Purchase reflect the collective brilliance of its constitutive parts.
Q: What are some new initiatives or programs of the Counseling Center that you want Professional Staff to be aware of?
A: We’re always happy to design workshops for groups of students based on needs that Professional Staff may be seeing in their work.
One operational change this year is that the first scheduled appointment at CBHS will be a Screening. This brief conversation involves the students reading and signing our consent for treatment and then filling out a short questionnaire. A counselor will review the questionnaire then help each student to identify the needs with which they want help and then offer them a menu of options for support. The menu of options includes: individual counseling, group counseling, referral to our CBHS psychiatrist, referral to another office on campus, or referral off campus for needs that fall outside of our scope of practice and resources.
Counseling and Behavioral Health Services (CBHS) is inching closer to a new partnership which is intended to expand supportive and well-being resources for students including peer to peer support. We don’t have ink on the agreement page so I can’t share specifics as of yet. Should this come to fruition it will be hard to miss our marketing campaign.
Q: What’s a fun fact that people might not know about you? We’ve heard you are an “ultramarathon” runner and juggler. Tell us more!
A: I taught myself to juggle at age 16 and have enjoyed teaching others ever since. My juggling skills are very basic but my “juggling for beginners” teaching skills are pretty good. Let me know if you want to learn!
I started running track at age 5 in 1971. Back in the old days youth athletic clubs supported track. In high school and college, I focused on playing soccer. I returned to running in the early 2000s running the NYC Marathon in 2000 and 2001. I dabbled with running from then until 2013 when I found my trail running home with SUNDAYRUNS.org. Since 2013 we have grown in numbers and level of interest. We have folks who come to do a three-mile hike and folks who train for and run 200 mile races. I ran my first 50k and 60k in 2014 and my first 50 miler in 2015. Since then, I have completed twelve 50 mile races and four 100 mile races. If you want to talk running or go for a run, I’m ready.
I am also a novice beekeeper who is proud to have successfully overwintered my two hives this past year and successfully harvested honey this summer.
