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Hot Topics - School Based
Just Released: Drafting a Blueprint for School-based Mental Health Service
Systems
Drafting a Blueprint for School-based Mental Health Service Systems
http://rtckids.fmhi.usf.edu/rtcpubs/study04/index.htm
Everyone now champions school-based mental health services, but what do they
mean exactly? Until now, decision-makers had no clear answers, and instead
faced a baffling array of program choices. No comprehensive blueprint has yet
emerged for designing a school-based service approach to address unique
community needs and capacities.
The new monograph from the Research and Training Center for Children’s Mental
Health, "School-Based Mental Health: An Empirical Guide for Decision-Makers",
provides practical information and advice for those engaged in developing and
implementing effective evidence-based services in the school setting.
Authored by Krista Kutash, Ph.D., Albert J. Duchnowski, Ph.D., and Nancy Lynn,
M.S.P.H., this resource draws on over a decade of investigation on delivery of
mental health services and supports in school settings, and factors that impact
effectiveness in meeting and emotional and developmental needs of the nation’s
children and youth.
To assist planners, the authors (1) describe the principal models and
approaches identified in the literature from mental health and education, (2)
critique the empirical support for the approaches described, and (3) suggests
how science, policy, and practice can be integrated to achieve effective
school-based mental health service systems through the adoption of the public
health model.
The monograph’s chapters discuss:
* The search for common definitions for prevention and intervention in
school-based mental health, and how universal, selective, and indicated
approaches are now conceptualized;
* Today’s influential models for school-based mental health service delivery;
* Programs and approaches endorsed in the literature and in primary directories
of evidence-based mental health services;
* Major federal policies that have supported--and in some cases
mandated--school-based mental health, with the implications;
* The state of the science on organizational structures and financing
mechanisms for school-based mental health programs;
* Reflections on the current status of school-based mental health, future
research needs, and how the public health model can be employed to support
extensive implementation of effective services.
The guide can be downloaded from the Research and Training Center website at
http://rtckids.fmhi.usf.edu/rtcpubs/study04/index.htm. For additional
information, contact Nancy Lynn at 813-974-7204.
This monograph is a product of the School-Based Mental Health Services Study of
the Research and Training Center for Children’s Mental Health at the University
of South Florida. The Center is jointly funded by the National Institute on
Disability and Rehabilitation Research, U.S Department of Education and the
Center for Mental Health Services, Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services
Administration
under grant number H133B040024.
The opinions contained in this document are those of the authors, and do not
necessarily reflect those of the U.S. Department of Education or Substance
Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration.
NEW REPORT OUT ON THE CURRENT STATUS OF MENTAL HEALTH IN SCHOOLS
Given the recommendations of the President’s New Freedom Commission on Mental
Health and the recent reauthorization of IDEA, this is a critical time in the
history of efforts to address the mental health of children and adolescents.
Because of this, the Center for Mental Health in Schools at UCLA has just
released a report entitled: "The Current Status of Mental Health in Schools: A
Policy and Practice Analysis." (Online at –
<http://smhp.psych.ucla.edu/currentstatusmh.htm>; hard copies can be
requested by email at or by calling toll free 866/846-4843.)
Brief overview of points stressed in the report:
At present, mental health activity is going on in schools with competing agenda
vying for the same dwindling resources. Diverse school and community
stakeholders are attempting to address complex, multifaceted, and overlapping
psychosocial and mental health concerns in highly fragmented and marginalized
ways. This has led to inappropriate competition for sparse resources and
inadequate results. The bottom line is that limited efficacy seems inevitable
as long as the full continuum of necessary programs is unavailable and staff
development remains deficient; limited cost effectiveness seems inevitable as
long as related interventions are carried out in isolation of each other;
limited systemic change is likely as long as the entire enterprise is
marginalized in policy and practice.
The current state of affairs calls for realigning policy and practice around a
unifying and cohesive framework. Initiatives for MH in schools must be
connected in major ways with the mission of schools and integrated into a
restructured system of education support programs and services. This means
braiding resources and interventions with a view to ensuring there is a system
of learning supports, rather than separate programs and services.
Coordinated efforts naturally are part of this, but the key is development of a
system of learning supports that meets overlapping needs and does so by fully
integrating mental health agenda into school improvement planning at school and
district levels. For this to happen, policy must end the marginalization of
such efforts and address the complications involved in making the essential
systemic changes. The report includes specific examples of policy that are
moving schools in new directions for providing student/learning supports.
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