Mental Health In Schools

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Students across the United States are increasingly showing signs of mental health problems. Dropout rates are increasing and the state averages are lowering as a result of poor mental health care in schools. Some students do not have proper access to mental health care and only receive their health care at school. Most schools have a program set in place, but they are not properly developed to work as efficiently as it could. School-based mental health programs could diminish adolescent mental health concerns by realizing the importance of programs, recognizing the need for the improvement of existing programs, and improving grades and graduation rates.
Regarding this, school-based mental health programs are important due to the amount of children …show more content…

Existing programs in schools are not developed in a way that would make progress with students with mental health issues, improving them would greatly impact the progress a child or adolescent would have with their mental health. In another source, the authors says just this, “If left untreated, childhood mental disorders may continue into adulthood. The National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) estimates that 57.7 million (26.2%) American Adults suffer from a mental health disorder,” (Gampetro et al. 24). Childhood mental disorders, if they are not treated, can worsen and be harder to treat as a child grows older and further into adulthood. To decrease the amount of adults that have a mental health disorder, we should start when they are children to focus on their mental health as well. To support having mental health clinics in schools, the authors of one source says this, “In addition, outcome data related to mental health showed that school-based mental health clinics enhanced children’s and adolescent’s access to care,” (Gampetro et al. 25). School-based mental health clinics would open some children to their only source of mental health care. Additionally, many families in America do not have regular access to health care, making the importance of in-school health care even more important as schools should focus on the …show more content…

Most times, mental illnesses are not caught until children are well into their teenage years, many times being shrugged off the same as they were during the childhood years. The next source says what was happening at a certain high school, MBHS, “At MBHS, many students at risk for failure were not identified until a crisis emerged or after they dropped out,” (Gruman et al. 334). Having poor mental health can interfere with student’s school ethic and work, providing evidence that school and mental health coincide with each other. Having an underdeveloped program in place can also affect student dropout rates. The same source supported, “77% of Mount Baker High School students graduated on time. Some students left to enroll in a country-wide alternative high school, but graduation rates at this program were only 15%. Counseling services were limited in the alternative school, so it is likely that even in this smaller setting, the mental health concerns of students were not recognized or addressed,” (Gruman et al. 334-335). When mental health concerns of students are not being adequately or fully met, it can impact the decision on whether or not they are going to graduate. Currently, I have a friend who has massively struggled

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