INNISFAIL - In an effort to provide more mental health support for students in the Chinook’s Edge School Division (CESD) impacted by the pandemic, trustees have authorized a $1.2 million, three-year initiative that will see specialists hired to work throughout the 11,000-student school system, say officials.
The decision to support the new strategy came by way of motion at the Jan. 12 board meeting following a presentation by Dr. Marcie Perdue, associate superintendent of student services.
Since the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic there has been an escalating prevalence of disruptive student mental health issues that are now impacting teachers, administrators, school staff and fellow students, she said.
“We are seeing such an increase,” Perdue told the Albertan. “We’ve had disruptive students before, of course, but we are seeing a huge increase in our schools and our classrooms.”
Asked about the ages of the disruptive students schools are seeing, she said, “It’s all grades and all communities. We are seeing more externalized disruptive behaviour with our younger students and more internalized behaviour with our older students, such as anxiety and depression.”
In an effort to meet the challenges, the new strategy will see six social emotional specialists hired to work throughout the division with student services teams.
The specialists will provide direction and expertise with specific classroom intervention to support complex social emotional needs for students, she said.
“There is a percentage of students who are exhibiting more complex mental health challenges, who require specialized expertise and sometimes individual therapy to meet their needs,” she said.
“We don’t want to be alarmist, but our schools are facing the reality that entire classrooms are being detrimentally affected by this at times.”
Trying to instruct entire classrooms while attempting to help those individual students with mental health issues is proving to be very difficult, she said.
“It has become an almost impossible task to accomplish both at present, without the additional mental supports this project will provide,” she said.
Perdue said she hopes to have the specialists in schools by early February.
Asked if finding those specialists to come into the program will be difficult, she said, “I think they might be a little bit because they have to have a mental health background and an education background because they are supporting classroom interventions for our kids in the schools.”
Once in the classrooms, the specialists will meet with student services teams and provide programs and supports for students who are struggling, she said.
“Their main role would be as consultants to our school teams,” she said.
Although the initiative has a three-year timeframe, it might continue beyond that if required, she said.
She commended CESD trustees for supporting the initiative.
In conjunction with the new strategy, trustees authorized chair Holly Bilton to write a letter to the provincial government sharing the “mounting concern and use of division resources in order to support moderate to several mental health challenges in a number of students.”
The letter will invite the provincial government to “share responsibility for establishing these key staff roles which have become essential in our schools.”
In a CESD release Bilton said: “We are also advocating to various levels of government for their involvement and support going forward, because this is an issue that is increasingly impacting Albertans as a whole. Mental health of our kids is paramount.”
