Friday, April 26, 2024
4/26/2024
To address the growing mental health concerns of youth, we have partnered with a local high needs school district to increase teacher ability to identify mental health concerns and symptomology in youth through training in Youth-Mental Health First Aid, Universal Screening, and Verbal De-escalation. This project will seek to improve the identification and referral process to improve efficiency and effectiveness in serving youth with behavioral and mental health needs by building partnerships with community mental health providers. The project, titled: Improving Access to Mental Health Services through Teacher Training and Universal Screening, is attempting to address the mental health concerns and improve service delivery for youth who may be experiencing mental health problems. To achieve this, researchers at the University of South Florida has partnered with a high needs school district to facilitate building school’s capacity to help students with mental health problems. Given the amount of time spent with students, a promising solution is to train teachers to identify and support children at risk for serious emotional and behavioral disturbances. Further, given the prevalence of mental health disorders that begin between 12-18 years, middle school is an ideal recognize pre-symptomology of mental illness (Patel et al., 2007). In the partnering district, nearly 1 in 10 students are in foster care, over 30% of students indicate having used an illicit substance within the last 30 days, and 43% of students reported being taunted or teased (i.e., bullied) within the last 30 days; all above Florida state averages (PCCHAR, 2012). The goals of this project are to (1) increase capacity of middle school teachers to recognize mental health risk within middle school students, (2) increase teachers’ skill and effective use of screening tools to identify mental health problems, and (3) improve access to school-and community-based mental health services through coaching on data-based decision-making, verbal de-escalation training, and coordination amongst service providers. To achieve these goals, teachers will be trained in Youth Mental Health First Aid (Y-MHFA), which is an evidence-based program which reviews typical adolescent development and how to identify common mental health challenges. Teachers will also be trained on the use of universal screening to enhance decision making and verbal de-escalation techniques. Nine middle schools will be recruited to participate in this project. Approximately, 200 middle school teachers will be trained each year, for a total of 600 teachers across three years. Based on national mental health prevalence data that shown that nearly 20% of children have a diagnosable mental health disorder (Merikcangas et al., 2010), it is expected at nearly 20% of participating youth will be identified for school-based intervention or referred for services at partnering community mental health providers. In an average school, only 20% of students showing symptoms are identified and subsequently provided with services (Hoagwood & Johnson, 2010); however, this project aims to address this discrepancy, leading to better mental health functioning and better student outcomes.
HHS’ Tracking Accountability in Government Grants System (TAGGS) website provides access to detailed descriptions of grants, loans, aggregated direct payments and other types of financial assistance awarded by the HHS Operating Divisions (OPDIVs) and the Office of the Secretary Staff Divisions (STAFFDIVs).
