Monday, April 29, 2024
4/29/2024
Bridges' Support Our Students (SOS) initiative will establish school-based mental health services in 5 local schools which include large Hispanic/Latino, foreign-born, LGBTQ, and other populations at high risk of trauma and resulting emotional and conduct issues. To address these, Bridges will collaborate with Child Health Development Institute (CHDI) to provide a variety of trauma-informed strategies of identification and treatment, and with a network of child-serving local agencies. The population of focus consists of 3 elementary schools in West Haven and a high school and middle school in Milford, both located in the Greater New Haven area of southern Connecticut. West Haven schools have large minority populations, with nearly a third of students speaking a language other than English at home, and nearly a fifth classified as "English Learners" at school. Over a fifth of the West Haven population is foreign born. If we accept the Pew Institute estimate that one-fourth of foreign-born residents are undocumented, over 5% of West Haven is undocumented, as is 2.75% of Milford. The Milford schools are a little over 20% minority, with fewer low-income students. but demographic shift is occurring in both towns; in 12016-2021 the Hispanic population rose by 25% in West Haven and 17% in Milford. Indicators of trauma in the West Haven schools include figures for substantiated child/abuse neglect reports, percentage of teens who considered suicide in the past year, and rate of juvenile arrests that exceed state rates by 70%, 64% and 51% respectively. At substantial risk in Milford are LGBTQ students (at 12%, substantially higher than the state average). Of high school youth who identify as gay, lesbian, or bisexual, 46.8% seriously considered attempting suicide in the past 12 months, over triple the rate for heterosexual youth per national data. Our proposed project will hire 4 full time clinicians to provide school-based services in the target schools. CHDI, the state-designated Performance Improvement Center, will supply staff training and support. Bridges' collaborative network will include Adam's House, an independent grief education center for children; the Milford Rape Crisis Center, Integrated Refugee and Immigrant Services, to support undocumented families; the Milford and West Haven Prevention Councils, Milford-Ansonia inter-agency meetings on investigation/management of child abuse cases; the Juvenile Review Board; and monthly truancy review meetings. Training for school staff will include Trauma ScreenTIME, a CHDI sponsored training on trauma screening in children. Clinicians will be trained in 5 trauma-informed evidence-based practices; the Modular Approach to Therapy for Children with Anxiety, Depression, Trauma and Conduct problems (MATCH-ADTC) which synthesizes elements from several treatments in one flexible model to better address comorbidity complexity; the Cognitive Behavioral Intervention for Trauma in Schools (CBITS) group intervention for 5-12th graders who have experienced trauma; BounceBack, a version of CBITS for younger children; Trauma Focused Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (TF-CBT), a child/parent treatment for youth; and Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR), used with children/adolescents with trauma with considerable success. The goals are to increase capacity of the two school systems to provide screening/treatment for youth with traumatic stress, with objectives targeting school personnel trained, students referred to Bridges' clinicians, students receiving services, students who complete CBITS/BB courses, and students who complete a course of individual treatment, including appropriate percentages of Black/Hispanic and LGBTQ students; and increase positive outcomes among youth in the two school systems, with objectives targeting students who see a decrease in symptoms per CPSS-V measures. Projected numbers served are as follows: Year 1 - 100; Years 2-5 - 160; for a total of 740.
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).
