East Valley School District adding mental health screenings and counseling

East Valley High School is implementing a mental health initiative that seeks to provide immediate intervention to its most at-risk students.

Piloted at a number of county schools, the initiative voluntarily screens students through a 20-minute survey completed in class and sorts them into tiers of risk based on their responses.

The most high-risk students, whose responses indicate immediate safety concerns such as suicidal thoughts, feeling threatened or unsafe, or considering hurting themselves, are quickly contacted by counselors before school lets out for the day.

The next tier, who may report drug use or symptoms of depression and anxiety, are contacted within two weeks of the survey. Two new clinicians are funded to do the work through funds from Spokane County.

The effort to identify students struggling with mental health issues comes amidst troubling trends.

At West Valley High School, for example, 143 students were screened under the initiative last school year. More than half of them fell into the tiers where help is quickly warranted.

Student mental health is top of mind at East Valley School District. Every year since eighth grade, at least one student in the high school’s class of 2025 has died, including some deaths by suicide, said superintendent Brian Talbott.

“We’ve had this really, really difficult wave of our own students passing, which has an absolute impact on, of course, our student body, our staff; they’ve been reeling. These are their kids,” Talbott said. “Then the school community and the community at large, it has that ripple effect.”

The loss of a peer is felt deeply in a relatively small district. East Valley teaches about 3,600 students, including about 950 enrolled at the high school.

Any student can request intervention, regardless of whether the survey indicates they need help. A licensed mental health provider connects with students ten times throughout the school year and more if necessary, tailoring therapy to the students’ needs. Counselors can then determine if a child needs further mental health support, drug abuse treatment or even basic necessities such as clothing or food.

The program is funded for five years at East Valley and includes two additional mental health counselors at the high school.

The district employs 12 total counselors, three of whom are paid for by the levy up for renewal this February. The levy partially pays for eight additional counselors housed in East Valley schools who work for other agencies.

“We have good support,” Talbott said. “Our system is overwhelmed.”

The initiative is unusual in its emphasis on intervention rather than solely gathering data on student mental health. Other gauges, such as the annual healthy youth survey administered by the state Department of Health, stop after collecting information on drug and alcohol use, suicidal ideation and support systems.

“It’s unethical to then go, ‘You’re going to tell me that you have an issue today? I’m never going to solve it for you or help you, because by the time I accumulate the data, put it out there, who knows where you are, and it’s all anonymous,’ ” said commissioner Mary Kuney, who has supported implementing the initiative in schools.

The program doesn’t require the student or their family have insurance, which Talbott said is among the most common road blocks toward receiving care.

Youth mental health is a nationwide issue felt in Spokane County. In 2022, five people aged 10 to 19 died by suicide in Spokane County. In the 20-29 age range, 23 people died by suicide. It was the second-leading cause of death for people aged 10-19 and 20-29, behind accidental deaths, according to the Spokane County Medical Examiner’s yearly report.

Nationally, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported that mental health among youths has been on the decline for the past decade, exacerbated by the anxieties and isolation felt during the COVID-19 pandemic.

“With the hurt that I have witnessed and seen, if they don’t want to answer, that’s up to them,” Talbott said. “But by not asking how they’re doing, it is negligence on our part.”