Guest View: A toolkit for mental health in our schools
Oregonians are feeling high levels of stress as we face our second year of the COVID-19 pandemic. This is especially true for children and teens as we have shifted to distance learning. The Oregon Department of Education has just released a Mental Health Toolkit and updated its Mental Health Website to help schools meet the mental and emotional support needs of students, families, staff and leaders as they navigate these uncertain times.
Schools are on the front line of providing mental and emotional health supports to students. Before COVID-19, roughly 1 in 5 youths in the United States experienced some form of emotional, social or behavioral difficulty. Since approximately 70% of America’s students access mental health services in school settings, according to an ACLU report, there is a pressing need for simple and effective tools to help communities stay emotionally well.
Research has convincingly shown that mental health is a cornerstone of education. Children and teens do better in school when student and staff mental health and well-being needs are being met. When a child struggles with difficult emotions, has trouble paying attention or communicating well or is learning to cope with a traumatic event, it can negatively impact his, her or their teacher and fellow students and undermine the youth’s ability to learn.
Addressing the mental health needs of communities requires a focus on health rather than “fixing what is broken.” This means recognizing each person’s inherent strengths, agency, voice, courage and determination by asking what makes communities thrive in the face of difficult challenges and how can we celebrate that resilience. Providing tools to school members — particularly those who have felt unseen, unheard or undervalued — empowers them to actively engage in their own learning and healing and can potentially reduce the stigma of mental illness or asking for help.
The mental health toolkit covers a wide variety of topics including how to cope with traumatic stress, the importance of student voice and addressing racism and bias and includes numerous carefully selected tools from leading experts. The content is aligned with ODE’s model of mental health that recognizes the equal importance of four key pillars of well-being:
- Social emotional learning
- Trauma-informed principles and practices
- Equity and racial equity, and
- Strengths-based multi-tiered systems of support
When one or more of the pieces of this puzzle are left out, health promotion efforts may do more harm than good.
Although online tools are no substitute for in-person relationships and connecting with members of our communities will remain challenging for several more months, the website provides a single place where schools and families can find help with many of today’s challenges.
In the coming year, ODE will continue its outreach to school districts, students, families, school staff, counselors and other school-based mental health providers to better understand the school-based mental health system’s strengths, challenges, gaps and opportunities. The agency also will offer resources in more languages, and will update and expand the website and toolkit to serve the diverse needs of school communities.
B. Grace Bullock, Ph.D., is the senior mental health strategist at the Oregon Department of Education. She has dedicated her career to mental health promotion. She lives in Eugene. She can be reached at grace.bullock@ode.state.or.us.