New Journal Volume Promotes School-Based Mental Health Services
Contact: Doug Nangle, (207) 581-2045; George Manlove, (207) 581-3756
ORONO (Maine) — Undetected and untreated mental health issues among the nation’s school children is causing millions of students to under perform academically and personally, and is considered by the U.S. Surgeon General to be a major public health concern.
Some of those problems contribute to rising occurrences of bullying, substance abuse, suspensions and even student suicides, according to studies reprinted in a new volume of assembled research by some of the nation’s top psychology and psychiatry researchers.
The volume, a 408-page special edition of the journal “Education and Treatment of Children,” co-edited by Douglas Nangle, a University of Maine psychology professor and director of clinical training in the Psychology Department, suggests broader school-based strategies for early recognition of and addressing mental health issues among students.
Published by West Virginia University Press, the special volume is a collection of 11 scholarly reviews and empirical articles describing successful school-based programs for various mental health concerns and disorders, and addressing ways to advance mental health screening in the nation’s schools. It includes both policy and practical approaches to the subject.
The volume supports evolving new attitudes about school mental health programs already endorsed by the Surgeon General, the National Institutes of Mental Health, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, the President’s New Freedom Commission on Mental Health and the American Academy of Pediatrics Policy Statement on School-Based Mental Health Services, among other agencies or organizations.
In 1999, the Surgeon General’s Report on Mental Health concluded that six million to nine million youngsters had emotional problems but were not getting help.
The situation “has caused us to challenge the typical, traditional treatment delivery models,” Nangle says. “We are not reaching enough children.”
Research assembled in the volume reports that 21 percent of children and adolescents between the ages of 9 and 17 have diagnosable psychiatric disorders. Additional youngsters have social and emotional difficulties that don’t meet the criteria necessary to be classified as a disorder, but still causes distress and impaired functioning, according to the volume’s introduction, written by Nangle and co-authors Carrie Masia-Warner of the New York University School of Medicine’s NYU Child Study Center and David Hansen of the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.
The volume’s introduction reports that of the 16 percent of youths who are treated for a mental health issue or disorder — such as ADHD (Attention Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder, PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder), depression, anxiety or emotional disorders — 75 percent had received that treatment at school.
The cited researchers make the case that schools are logical places to identify, treat or counsel students experiencing mental health issues, and that they do not carry the stigma often associated with traditional mental health facilities.
“Schools provide unparalleled contact with youth and therefore represent a single location through which the majority can be reached,” the introduction says. “Such ease of accessibility creates the optimal environment to launch prevention, early identification, and intervention efforts that may prevent the development of serious secondary dysfunction, such as suicidal behavior or substance abuse.”
The volume discusses some of the childhood disorders that can result in disruptive or harmful behavior, which can lead to underachievement or more serious dysfunctional behavior if undetected, and it highlights examples where school-based mental health services have been successful.
It also explores the adequacies and inadequacies of public school settings and staffing to address children’s mental health issues. Research in the special volume assesses some of the barriers to providing more comprehensive mental health services in schools, including attitudes about staff training and competency, costs, parental and peer involvement, confidentiality and privacy issues, plus questions about the appropriateness of schools adding mental health services to the list of things they do.
Nangle expects the volume to serve as a resource for school administrators, policymakers, teachers, mental health professionals and researchers working in schools and other settings, in addition to school board members and parents. Beneficiaries of implementing the recommendations in the special issue would be children and families, and society as a whole, Nangle says.
Most school personnel are interested in mental health, Nangle says, but decisions about providing better services often come down to shifting resources, he says.