For current and prospective students, the educational sector can present various challenges: Assignments, exams, social dynamics, career aspirations and potential work commitments. The pressure to perform well while meeting multifarious obligations can seem impossible, but here are some ways the educational sector is addressing mental health
In Ontario, Progressive Conservative Natalie Pierre became the driving force and advocate for mental health literacy for children in grades 7 and 8. For children in Grade 10, the career education will reflect new information to incorporate the importance of understanding and managing mental health. These essential changes were a result of the MPP’s 17-year-old son taking his life after a university campus tour. Learning modules that are available for next fall were created in concert with School Mental Health Ontario.
Education Minister Stephen Lecce proposes to spend 42 million by 2025 on what he believes will provide young students with the opportunity to gain various skills and toolsets to help maintain their mental health or moderate mental illness while functioning in their day-to-day personal and professional lives. Specifically, the curriculum will set the students up for long-term success and reduce the stigma concerning Mental Illness.
Since 2018, the funds devoted to mental health have risen 500% by 2024.
BounceBack
There are many programs available to help raise mental health awareness as well. Bounceback is an upskilling management program for people who struggle with depression. The Canadian Mental Health Association backs this and has features that include periodic calls with a designated person who acts as a semi-accountability counsellor. It can be accessed via referral by a family physician and includes several workbook modules created by Chris Williams to help adults deal with a variety of issues that affect mental health.
The program is several weeks long and covers topics including Building Relationships with your family and friends, overcoming sleep problems, unhelpful things you do, Starting…and How to Keep Going If you Feel Stuck, Facing Fears and Overcoming Avoidance, Noticing Extreme and Unhelpful Thinking, Changing Extreme and Unhelpful Thinking, Understanding Worry and Stress, and Practical Problem Solving.
The Bounceback program is less hands-on than the conventional counselling resources. While you may be able to flip your index finger through all the books, you may realize that some experiences may be so painful that they require spirituality and faith.
Modern research indicates that an elementary student’s mental health can be impacted by how they perform in school. It would fall on the educator’s conduct to ensure that the environment students learn in is positive and psychologically safe to promote healthy social interaction. Suppose there is no support system in place. In that case, there are several indicators educators can use to determine if a decline or factor is influencing mental health: Class attendance, homework completion, and presence during classroom instruction and activities, among other things.
Engagement
According to some research, Educators spend almost 1300 hours with students in the classroom. During this time, Teachers monitor engagement with the lesson and student conduct about performance. As the educator is on the front lines of observing a student, they have the unique opportunity to spot any abnormal behaviour that could harm mental health early on and manage or prevent it.
Conversely, this would put educators in a position where they can act as secondary guardians to the children’s parents and provide adequate assistance through resources and proactive plans to diminish the need for intervention.
Co-Responders as a Resource for Mental Health (Case Study)
Stephanie Williams, an alum of Adler University’s 2012 Master of Arts in Forensic Mental Health Leadership, serves as a prime example of how education (especially mental health education) can be used practically to improve relations between law enforcement and those who may not have had the methodology for dealing with unique and difficult circumstances. Williams explains how co-responders at UCHealth in Colorado work with local police.
“It can be suicide attempts or threats. It can be a traffic stop, or maybe someone’s having a panic attack. It can be a domestic violence incident where someone on scene, typically the victim, is having a difficult time emotionally regulating and understanding what’s going on.”
https://www.adler.edu/2023/05/23/future-of-law-enforcement-alum-offers-insight-on-co-responding-to-mental-health-crisis-calls/
Stephanie also explains that the length of study in mental health and intervention can vary greatly depending on the amount of experience someone has. She draws the comparison of how a police officer with 40 hours of crisis instruction and intervention would fall short of the training undergone by a licensed and experienced clinician.
When paired together, educated, licensed behaviour health clinicians working as Co-responders and police can positively impact mental health, as evidenced by an August 2018-2019 report detailing the results of 4357 calls. Potentially traumatic events such as emergency department transports, being arrested, and visits to psych wards were diverted. They were replaced by providing more significant support and better relations with community residents and the police.
Another resource that may go unnoticed for mental health education is listening to music artists who may have gone through their own struggles and vocalizing them through moving songs. Rap and rock Artists LL Cool J’s “Candy,” and Orgy’s “Can’t Take This.” Shinedown’s “Burning Bright” is a solid example that may be highly economical in finding individuals who may have gone through similar experiences.
Realizing that one is not alone and that pain can be used to sustain interconnected industries as a sort of ‘Dark Triad Business Model’ can help individuals reclaim their peace and spirit.
References:
Ontario introducing mental health education for students | CBC News (2023) CBCnews. Available at: https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/ontario-mental-health-students-1.6827886 (Accessed: 16 January 2024).
(No date) Ocean. Available at: https://ocean.cognisantmd.com/intake/IntakePortal.html?eReqRef=86b6adda-6749-4cd3-941b-fc10b4abffcf (Accessed: 16 January 2024).
Mastronardi, S., Millar, M., Toldo, J., Kay, B., & Geffs, A. (2022, April 1). Educators’ roles in promoting and protecting Mental Health. Classroom Practice in 2022. Retrieved [date], from https://ecampusontario.pressbooks.pub/educ5202/chapter/educators-roles-in-promoting-and-protecting-mental-health/
(No date a) Future of law enforcement: Alum offers insight on co-responding to … Available at: https://www.adler.edu/2023/05/23/future-of-law-enforcement-alum-offers-insight-on-co-responding-to-mental-health-crisis-calls/ (Accessed: 16 January 2024).
Burning Bright (2010). YouTube. 7 March. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SO2QId331PE (Accessed: 16 January 2024).
Candy (2018). YouTube. 26 July. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lldp9biTeqs (Accessed: 16 January 2024).
Can’t Take This (2009). YouTube. 29 June. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lBfU_Joyg0c (Accessed: 16 January 2024).
