Academic and Career Planning
May Newsletter - Mental Health in/Outside of School
What is Positive Mental Health and Why is it Important?
What is mental health?
Mental health includes our emotional, psychological, and social well-being. It affects how we think, feel, and act as we cope with life. It also helps determine how we handle stress, relate to others, and make choices. Mental health is important at every stage of life, from childhood and adolescence through adulthood and aging.
Why is mental health important?
Mental health is important because it can help you to:
- Cope with the stresses of life
- Be physically healthy
- Have good relationships
- Make meaningful contributions to your community
- Work productively
- Realize your full potential
Ways to Achieve Positive Mental Health
How to look after your mental health
- Talk about your feelings. Talking about your feelings can help you stay in good mental health and deal with times when you feel troubled. ...
- Keep active. ...
- Eat well. ...
- Drink sensibly. ...
- Keep in touch. ...
- Ask for help. ...
- Take a break. ...
- Do something you're good at.
- Being physically active. Exercise can reduce feelings of stress and depression and improve your mood.
- Getting enough sleep. Sleep affects your mood. ...
- Healthy eating. Good nutrition will help you feel better physically but could also improve your mood and decrease anxiety and stress.
Why Does the School Care?
According to NAMI (National Alliance on Mental Illness) One in six U.S. youth aged 6-17 experience a mental health disorder each year, and half of all mental health conditions begin by age 14. Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), behavior problems, anxiety, and depression are the most commonly diagnosed mental disorders in children. Yet, about half of youth with mental health conditions received any kind of treatment in the past year.
Undiagnosed, untreated or inadequately treated mental illnesses can significantly interfere with a student’s ability to learn, grow and develop. Since children spend much of their productive time in educational settings, schools offer a unique opportunity for early identification, prevention, and interventions that serve students where they already are. Youth are almost as likely to receive mental health services in an education setting as they are to receive treatment from a specialty mental health provider — in 2019, 15% of adolescents aged 12-17 reported receiving mental health services at school, compared to 17% who saw a specialty provider.
School-based mental health services are delivered by trained mental health professionals who are employed by schools, such as school psychologists, school counselors, school social workers, and school nurses. By removing barriers such as transportation, scheduling conflicts and stigma, school-based mental health services can help students access needed services during the school-day. Children and youth with more serious mental health needs may require school-linked mental health services that connect youth and families to more intensive resources in the community.
Early identification and effective treatment for children and their families can make a difference in the lives of children with mental health conditions. We must take steps that enable all schools to increase access to appropriate mental health services. Policies should also consider reducing barriers to delivering mental health services in schools including difficulty with reimbursement, scaling effective treatments, and equitable access.
What does CFSD offer?
School Counselors offer short term/immediate help. They are not therapists.
Trailways Counseling - Cambria-Friesland Schools has collaborated with Trailways Counseling to provide onsite mental health services here at Cambria-Friesland Schools.
What services are offered by Trailways Counseling
Mental Health Counseling: Individual Counseling, Substance Abuse Counseling, Group Counseling
Mentoring: Recreational Mentoring, Therapeutic Mentoring, School/Community Presentations
Comprehensive Community Services: Psychotherapy, Individual Skill Development, Psychoeducation
Mental Health in Wisconsin - From the Wisconsin Fact Sheet (NAMI)
- 859,000 adults in Wisconsin have a mental health condition.....That's more than 3x the population of Madison.
- 1 in 6 US youth ages 6 -17 experience a mental health disorders each year. 70,000 Wisconsinites ages 12 - 17 have depression.
- Of the 266,000 adults in Wisconsin who did not receive needed mental health care, 37.3% did not because of cost.
- 5.8% of people in state are uninsured.
- 2,185,992 people in Wisconsin live in a community that does not have enough mental health professionals.
- High school students with depression are more than 2x more likely to drop out than their peers.
- 41.8% of Wisconsinites ages 12-17 who have depression did not receive any care in the last year.
- 7 in 10 youth in the juvenile justice system have a mental health condition
(information compiled in February 2021)
What Can Parents Do:
Create a sense of belonging. Feeling connected and welcomed is essential to children's positive adjustment, self-identification, and sense of trust in others and themselves. Building strong, positive relationships among students, school staff, and parents is important to promoting mental wellness.
Promote resilience. Adversity is a natural part of life and being resilient is important to overcoming challenges and good mental health. Connectedness, competency, helping others, and successfully facing difficult situations can foster resilience.
Develop competencies. Children need to know that they can overcome challenges and accomplish goals through their actions. Achieving academic success and developing individual talents and interests helps children feel competent and more able to deal with stress positively. Social competency is also important. Having friends and staying connected to friends and loved ones can enhance mental wellness.
Ensure a positive, safe environment. Feeling safe is critical to students' learning and mental health. Promote positive behaviors such as respect, responsibility, and kindness. Prevent negative behaviors such as bullying and harassment. Provide easily understood rules of conduct and fair discipline practices and ensure an adult presence in common areas, such as hallways, cafeterias, locker rooms, and playgrounds. Teach children to work together to stand up to a bully, encourage them to reach out to lonely or excluded peers, celebrate acts of kindness, and reinforce the availability of adult support.
Teach and reinforce positive behaviors and decision making. Provide consistent expectations and support. Teaching children social skills, problem solving, and conflict resolution supports good mental health. "Catch" them being successful. Positive feedback validates and reinforces behaviors or accomplishments that are valued by others.
Encourage helping others. Children need to know that they can make a difference. Pro-social behaviors build self-esteem, foster connectedness, reinforce personal responsibility, and present opportunities for positive recognition. Helping others and getting involved in reinforces being part of the community.
Encourage good physical health. Good physical health supports good mental health. Healthy eating habits, regular exercise and adequate sleep protect kids against the stress of tough situations. Regular exercise also decreases negative emotions such as anxiety, anger, and depression.
Be Educated on symptoms of and help for mental health problems. Information helps break down the stigma surrounding mental health and enables adults and students recognize when to seek help. School mental health professionals can provide useful information on symptoms of problems like depression or suicide risk. These can include a change in habits, withdrawal, decreased social and academic functioning, erratic or changed behavior, and increased physical complaints.
Ensure access to mental health supports. School psychologists, counselors, and social workers can provide a continuum of mental health services for students ranging from universal mental wellness promotion and behavior supports to staff and parent training, identification and assessment, early interventions, individual and group counseling, crisis intervention, and referral for community services.
Provide a continuum of mental health services. School mental health services are part of a continuum of mental health care for children and youth. Build relationships with community mental health resources. Be able to provide names and numbers to parents.
Resources:
https://www.nami.org/Advocacy/Policy-Priorities/Improving-Health/Mental-Health-in-Schools
https://medlineplus.gov/howtoimprovementalhealth.html