While student mental health remains a top concern for many in education, federal data reveals It’s not all bad news. At least it’s not getting worse in all areas and could be getting better in some areas.
The National Center for Education Statistics has released its biennial report, Crime, Violence, Discipline, and Safety in U.S. Public Schools, for the 2021-22 school year. It uses survey responses from nearly 2,700 P-12 school principals to understand the myriad issues that affect students and the way schools operate.
Nearly 90% of schools reported increased social and emotional support for students during the 2021-22 school year.
However, 39 percent of schools reported that a lack of access to qualified professionals and mental health funding is a major impediment to efforts to support student mental health. Around the same time, the U.S. Department of Education stated: $275.7 million Some of the emergency school funds were spent on mental health support for students and staff.
While conversations about the importance of student mental health have grown since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, Amir Gilmore says schools are putting the necessary support systems in place. He points out that there are still countless reasons why there are not enough resources for this. . Gilmore is the associate dean for equity and inclusion for student success and retention in the Washington State University College of Education.
Of course, there are also workforce barriers, such as a time-consuming pipeline of mental health professionals and a lack of candidates in certain regions. Gilmore said many schools have only one mental health professional, who can be the only support for hundreds or thousands of students. That can lead to burnout, he said, without mentioning the need for counselors equipped to work with students of color and students with disabilities.
“We’re also facing this kind of crisis of not having enough teachers in schools to actually work with students,” Gilmore said. Everyone is really thin. ”
Therefore, the responsibility of addressing students’ mental health issues always falls on teachers. Gilmore argues that placing that responsibility on teachers’ shoulders does not solve the problem, but instead adds to the burden of their daily work.
“Do we talk about mental health? Do we talk a lot about SEL in schools and teacher training programs? Yes, but teachers can’t be everything, right?” Gilmore says. “They can’t wear that many different hats, and it’s not a very sustainable process for them either.”
Despite recent efforts and funding to alleviate mental health workforce shortages, “it will likely take years to ensure that all students have access to mental health services.” ” [mental health] They need experts and appropriate support,” Kelly Vaillancourt-Straubach, director of policy and advocacy for the National Association of School Psychologists, told EdSurge in an email interview.
Although her organization recommends that schools maintain a student-to-school psychologist ratio of 1:500, Vaillancourt-Straubach said the national average is more than double, and some It has been pointed out that in some school districts, the ratio exceeds 1:2000. In some areas, this shortage means that students who struggle to access care at school may have difficulty finding mental health professionals in their communities as well. , she added.
“We know that many school districts wanted to use ESSER funds to hire more staff, but the workforce shortage has prevented them from doing so,” said Vaillancourt-Straubach, an elementary school teacher. He mentioned the Secondary School Emergency Relief Fund. “What we’re hearing is that some school districts are worried that they won’t be able to maintain services or hire staff once the ESSER funds expire.”
of Pandemic Relief Fund Expiry Date In fact, the countdown to the end of some school-based services has begun. For example, no additional mental health funding was allocated from the state of Texas; Houston school district will lose seven ‘intensive mental health professionals’ After funds run out.’Funding cliff’ seen in other parts of the country Intimidate Denver’s program Added mental health professionals to 10 schools.
Another challenge is that even though society is starting to recognize the importance of mental health in general, some educators, whether administrators or teachers, are struggling with the idea that mental health needs to be prioritized. Gilmore added that this is something he does not agree with at all.
It extends to the community level. Not all voters or parents in a particular school district necessarily support securing more funding for student mental health services, he said. Social-emotional learning is becoming politicized. As well as critical race theory.
“I think when you make things so highly politicized, you forget that at the end of the day, it’s a student issue,” Gilmore says. By opposing social-emotional learning in schools, “some parents and some experts may say, ‘We’re doing this for our students,’ but I would argue that we are just taking away more tools and resources for students to be themselves, to express themselves. In many areas of children’s and adolescents’ lives, there are few spaces in which they can express themselves freely. ”
Gilmore added that he feels mental health resources are being strained by other factors outside of schools’ control, such as the stress of inflation and whether local voters will accept increases in district budgets.
He has watched the issue play out in his city of Spokane, Washington.
“Some communities say, ‘No, we don’t want to invest any more money in schools.’ We don’t want taxes to go up,” he says. “Can all taxpayers see the value in hiring mental health professionals?” [in schools]? Your mileage will vary.? ”
Just as the scramble to launch remote learning in 2020 highlighted inequities in schools, Gilmore says mental health resources, or lack thereof, persist today.
“I’m confident that in high-income school districts, parents within the district can probably fund it,” he says. “But students and low-income areas will face the same problem of not being able to hire mental health counselors. The current situation is very unfair.”
