School-based mental health services are essential for students’ wellbeing, but those services are being challenged due to the need for more mental health professionals to fill open positions.
Walk down the halls of your local high school and you might not realize there’s a crisis underway. But beneath the happy-go-lucky exteriors, many youth say they feel stressed, anxious and depressed.
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), 40% of students experience sadness and hopelessness on a regular basis, and 20% have seriously considered suicide. While many mental health professionals say social media plays a role, the COVID pandemic also played a role, resulting in the youth mental health crisis we are facing today. During COVID, students were isolated from each other at a critical time in their development. Not being able to interact with teachers, friends, counselors, and peers was difficult for many students – especially those with a traumatic home life.
Kelli Nowak is the Director of Behavioral Health for HealthFinders Collaborative. She says when you take away the school-based resources and support that students receive, it’s like cutting them off from the buoys that keep them afloat.
“I distinctly remember when the pandemic forced schools to close, I was a school-based therapist at the time and my initial thought was ‘this is going to be catastrophic for some students’, Kelli recalls. “I recognized that their home environment was tough, and many would be tasked with helping their siblings with distance learning while they also tried to manage their own work. In addition, we're working with students and families who have immigrated to the United States and have experienced horrific things in their home country as well as on their journey to the United States. While I think many who work with these young people recognize that those experiences were stressful, they might not understand the impact that trauma has had on the students’ ability to learn, build connections and acclimate to a completely new community and culture.”
As the Behavioral Health Coordinator for Faribault Public Schools, Janet Lewis Muth sees the struggles Faribault youth are facing on a daily basis. She says, like many other school districts across the country, Faribault schools are seeing an increased need for youth mental health support. She’s not certain if the increase has to do with more students needing help than before, or if it is related to a decrease in stigma leading to more youth talking openly about their problems.
“We are lucky to have a strong team of social workers in our district who meet with students both individually and in group settings, but we still have a huge need for students to be able to meet with a therapist,” Janet says. “When we know that a student is struggling, we generally work with the family to ensure that the student is receiving support at school. If the student needs more support than the school can provide, we help the family access community supports and connect the student to our school-linked mental health professionals.”
Schools are struggling to meet the need.
For over a decade, HealthFinders Collaborative (HFC) has partnered with Faribault Public Schools to provide students with much-needed medical and dental services in the schools. HealthFinders has also been building individual and group mental health and substance use programs across the district, which have been enthusiastically supported by both staff and students. But finding qualified providers to fill the open positions is an ongoing challenge.
HealthFinders Executive Director Charlie Mandile says the shortage of mental health therapists is affecting communities nationwide, and our youth and schools are feeling the impact.
“The need for mental health therapy among the youth in our communities has reached a critical point. School-based therapists can provide early intervention where it’s most needed, directly within students’ learning environments. Integrating therapists into school settings maximizes access to care and gives students access to consistent support, improving their ability to thrive both academically and emotionally. We have all of the infrastructure to support this, but right now we are working to urgently address this workforce gap. We would love to talk to therapists of any type who are interested in joining our diverse and passionate team, driven by our mission to support our community, and investing in our youth. “
Schools play an important role in helping students to be healthy and successful. According to the National Library of Medicine, 70% of youth nationwide who get mental health support are getting it at school. Schools offer an opportunity to reach a large number of youth through education and can offer early intervention to improve the health and wellbeing of students.
HealthFinders social worker and school-based mental health therapist Maritza Navarro says she too is seeing an increase in students feeling distressed, sad and lonely. She sees a lot of kids with anxiety, depression, and trauma but also kids feeling stressed about their safety, their family’s finances, and meeting basic needs.
“We are currently looking to hire more providers to provide services to more students,” says Maritza. “I mainly focus on providing services to Spanish-speaking students as I am able to utilize my own experiences with the Latinx/Hispanic culture to assist in understanding the students’ beliefs, traditions, perspectives, and the stigma that may be influenced by their culture. About 90% of the students I see who are Spanish-speaking and newly arrived to the U.S. have experienced traumas and are having a hard time managing those traumas and processing their distressing emotions.”
HealthFinders is uniquely positioned to help youth.
Kelli Nowak says one of the best things about working at HealthFinders is the creative freedom given to staff to meet the unique needs of those in our community, including youth.
“When it was determined that youth in an area school would benefit from a space where they can talk about their struggles with substance use, or the impact it's had on their family, HFC was able to respond with Recovery Support Groups. When it was identified that a similar type of group would be beneficial in a setting outside of school, we were able to duplicate the group in the clinic setting.”
HealthFinders has recently added more youth-centered programming during the week to allow youth to have more opportunities to engage and connect outside of school time. Kelli says it can be hard for students who aren’t in sports or other school-sponsored activities to find things to do for recreation in rural Minnesota.
“There are not many places youth can hang out and just be themselves, but I think HFC is positioned in a way that is trying to support their access to those spaces, as well as with providing opportunities that some youth might not have for various reasons, such as events or field trips that are able to expose youth to things in their community that they might not have been able to experience otherwise.”
It's often a challenge to get youth to open up and ask for help. Too often, youth take on the responsibility of holding sensitive information about a friend or peer and aren’t sure where to turn for help. Kelli says many students tell her they have a friend who’s struggling but don’t know what to do or who to talk to.
“ They take it upon themselves to take care of them, support them, or even respond if they are in crisis. They feel the pressure of being responsible keeping that person alive. That's too much responsibility for one person, let alone a teen. If a youth doesn't feel comfortable going to their parents or guardians with their concerns, any other trusted adult will do. All youth should also feel empowered to contact professional help in situations where it's needed. That can involve calling or texting 988, the nationwide crisis hotline, or calling 911 if the situation feels unsafe.”
Apart from contacting someone for help, other things that you can do is listen, validate their experience, and let them know that you care.
Kelli adds:
“Sometimes, caring looks like telling someone else if you think your friend is unsafe. It's not uncommon for teens to feel like they're being a bad friend if they tell someone that a friend is struggling with thoughts of suicide, self-harm or something similar. It's not uncommon for them to worry that their friend will get mad if they tell the counselor at school that they are cutting. My general guidance to teens who have these very normal fears is that it's better to have your friend be upset with you and get help they need than it is to keep unsafe situations secret and have something bad happen. I often say, ‘I'd rather have you be alive and pissed at me than dead.’"
If someone you know is struggling with a mental health or substance use concern, you can reach out to school personnel or to HealthFinders to start a conversation. If someone is concerned about a student in crisis, they should call 988 to speak to a mental health professional about those concerns.
If you are interested in learning more about a school-based therapist position, reach out to careers@healthfindersmn.org.
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