The grants will pay for professional development for teachers, so they can better respond to mental and behavioral health challenges. The money will also be used to build partnerships with community-based organizations, which help students access services outside of schools. And some funds will help pay for software to track how services are being used. <\/p>\n
The grants are a promising step forward, but they are \u201cnot enough\u201d said Pamela Sager, executive director at the Parent Professional Advocacy League, a nonprofit focused on the mental health of children. <\/p>\n
The grants will only cover continued mental health services for 14 percent of school districts in the state, Sager said. <\/p>\n
\u201cMore funding needs to be devoted to mental health in the schools,\u201d she said. \u201cMost of the awards barely cover the cost of one additional counselor or clinician.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Department of Elementary and Secondary Education, overseeing the grant funds, plans to dedicate a chunk of the money to piloting a universal mental health questionnaire for students. Once up and running, the questionnaire could be used as a screening system at every public school in Massachusetts to assess and determine individual student\u2019s mental health needs<\/p>\n
Haverhill Public Schools, in northeastern Massachusetts, will receive $45,000 through the grant program. The district will use the money to build on mental health efforts spearheaded in 2025, including strengthening partnerships with community agencies that offer mental health support like a phone line for students to text or call when they need assistance. <\/p>\n
Haverhill is also focusing on using the funds to train staff to implement substance abuse education to encourage kids to make healthy decisions about consuming alcohol, tobacco, or other illicit substances.<\/p>\n
\u201cTogether, these efforts benefit students by ensuring they get the right help at the right time so they can stay healthy, engaged, and successful in school,\u201d said Jami Dion, director of guidance, counseling, and student support services at Haverhill Public Schools.<\/p>\n
The state has done much work over the past five years to increase the amount of mental health professionals that are available in schools, including a $25 million grant<\/a> last November to build the pipeline of behavioral health workers in the state, Tutwiler said. And in February, another $5.5 million in grants were distributed to 60 school districts, educational collaboratives, and charter schools to improve access to to mental health services for students.<\/p>\n Still, there is a 1 to 686 ratio<\/a> of school psychologists to students in Massachusetts K-12 public schools, according to the National Alliance on Mental Illness. <\/p>\n \u201cThis is worse than the recommended ratio of one school psychologist for every 500 students,\u201d the nonprofit said in a fact sheet published in March of last year. <\/p>\n Meanwhile, 59,000 Massachusetts adolescents have serious thoughts of suicide each year, the alliance said. <\/p>\n In schools across Massachusetts, kids are still struggling to bounce back from the pandemic when schools saw an uptick in mental health issues, experts said. <\/p>\n In 2021, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention did a survey in Massachusetts schools and found that more than 40 percent of high schoolers struggled with persistent feelings of sadness or hopelessness and nearly 30 percent experienced poor mental health.<\/p>\n \u201cDuring lockdown they weren\u2019t going to school and interacting with their peers and their teachers so kids lost a couple of years of social development,\u201d said Danna Mauch, president of the Massachusetts Association for Mental Health. \u201cWe are still struggling to recover.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWe were often failing to provide mental health services where kids spend the majority of their time and that is at school,\u201d Mauch said.<\/p>\n Mariana Sim\u00f5es can be reached at mariana.simoes@globe.com<\/a>. Follow her on X @MariRebuaSimoes<\/a>.<\/p>\n