Conversations About Student Mental Health

In this episode Chris Leonard, Thrive’s Chief Learning Officer, spoke with Alina Liao, the founder and CEO of Zenit, a ”radical wellness” company whose philosophy is that everything we do must advance the wellness of all our stakeholders.

Highlights include:

• How journaling can be an extremely powerful mental health tool
• Leaning into tradeoffs and why this is so important in cultivating wellness
• The importance of coming back to pride and joy

In this episode Chris Leonard, Thrive’s Chief Learning Officer, recently spoke with power couple, Michael and Nita Creekmore about their firsthand knowledge of the current challenges that students, teachers, and parents are facing and clear ideas of how to support ourselves, our children, our students and our colleagues. 

Highlights include:

• Challenges among students and staff right now and what to expect as we move into 2023
• Supports  teachers are not getting that they need more of
• School-based interventions and the importance of tier 1 support
• Supports for parents 

In this episode Chris Leonard, Thrive’s Chief Learning Officer, recently spoke with Dr. Michael J. Hynes, Superintendent of the Port Washington School District in New York and an award-winning educator who advocates for a holistic approach to educating children. Dr. Hynes shared strategies for helping staff navigate the challenges ahead, along with his secret sauce for helping students get the most out of school. 

Highlights include:

• The importance of building relationships and knocking down silos
• Ideas for self-care that help you become the best version of yourself
• What it takes to adjust attitudes and create a healthy school climate & culture
• Strategies for restoring the balance between the physical, emotional, academic, and social at school

In this episode of Conversations About Student Mental Health, Chris Leonard tackles the question of how to prepare teachers to support the growing social and emotional needs of students. Chris talks with Steven Cates, an interventionist at Southside Community School in Tucson, Arizona, and a participant in Thrive Alliance Group’s Coaching, Training, and Certification program. Chris and Steven discuss a new approach to mental wellness support: raising the capacity of the entire staff to improve school climate & culture.

Highlights include:

• How mental wellness training and coaching for school staff improves school climate and culture, which in turn improves student outcomes 
• Self-paced training provides flexibility and better retention of learning
• Teachers learn psychological principles around student mental health and trauma, and how these impact behavior and create barriers to learning
• Coaching sessions give staff the chance to share experiences and learn intervention strategies 
• Participants gain a set of tools and strategies to support both students & staff members
• How the program builds a sense of community

• Why schools must support students’ emotional wellbeing along with academics
• The three facets of maximizing mental wellness, and why proactive school leaders need to shift the focus to improve climate and culture 
• How trauma-informed practices, including mindfulness, movement, and breathing, can help students develop self-regulating strategies
• How to avoid power struggles and fear tactics that harm everyone
• Giving school staff the tools and training they need for classroom management also helps to build morale and retain staff

It’s no secret that the mental health needs of youth have been intensifying. Getting young people the treatment they need in a crisis has become a greater challenge because of the length of time they must spend in the emergency room (often more than 12 hours) waiting for risk assessments and acute follow up care.

In this episode, Chris Leonard talks with Shana Palmieri, the co-founder and Chief Clinical Officer of XFERALL, an innovative mobile technology platform that can help schools (and healthcare and community professionals) get faster access to best-fit acute care, as well as other treatment resources, for young people experiencing a mental health crisis. 

Highlights include:

• The devastating outcomes that happen with delayed and denied access to acute mental health care.
• How schools can use XFERALL to quickly find access to inpatient care for students, with the chance to avoid the emergency department and associated costs.
• How the system takes the burden off school professionals to judge a student’s risk level. 
• Additional proactive interventions schools can put in place to reduce the incidents of mental health crises among students and prevent the worst outcomes.

As the COVID pandemic rages on, students are facing significant challenges, including:

• Overcoming learning loss
• Dramatic increases in mental health issues among children and teens (leading to rising rates of emergency department visits and suicide attempts)
• Increased gun violence against children and school shootings
• Prolonged social isolation
• Increases in behavioral issues in the classroom and beyond.

In this episode, Chris Leonard talks with three teachers about the difficulties they are facing, what is working, what is not working, and what more we can do to help our students and schools get back on track. Chris’ guests are Alexandra Lemm, a 7th grade English teacher in Texas, Allie Szczecinski, a special educator and SEL coach in Illinois, and David Gibbons, a teacher in Texas with a focus on curriculum development.

In the past 18 months, many students experienced gaps in academic, social, and emotional development. Parents are worried about what their children have missed and how their school will ensure stability and readiness for what comes next. Needless to say, the current situation can be a recipe for tension between parents and educators. So how do we foster positive working relationships between educators and parents? Chris Leonard talks with Dr. Gerry Crisonino, Assistant Superintendent of Special Services in the Jersey City, NJ Public Schools, who currently serves over 4200 students with disabilities.

Highlights include:

• The importance of listening and being open to criticism
• How to respond to parents who come in ready for a fight
• Tips for keeping the focus on what's best for the child
• Ideas for communicating with the parent community
• Sharing content to bridge the gap and strengthen relationships

In this episode, Chris Leonard shares advice for parents to help their school-refusing child get back to school. Chris and his guest also touch on how schools can partner with parents to form a team to help a student get back on track.

This time, Chris gets interviewed by his guest, Jayne Demsky. Jayne is a parent who once faced her own son’s school avoidance and became an advocate for families dealing with this challenging issue. She founded School Refusal Hope in 2014 and recently launched her new website, schoolavoidance.org, to provide guidance and support for families.

Jayne also serves on the Public Policy Committee for the New Jersey state office of the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI), and is a NAMI Smarts Advocacy trainer, where she presents workshops on mental health advocacy. 

Highlights include:

• What to do (and what NOT to do) when a child won’t get up for school
• Tips and tools for uncovering the root of the problem
• Advice about setting consequences, contracts, and homeschooling
• When to seek out more support, and what to do when the student refuses help 
• Steps schools can take to bring students back into the building, and how they can use data to prevent school refusal

After more than a year of hybrid and remote learning, students have experienced a new normal of staying home. School professionals are concerned that a wave of school refusal will hit us this fall. How can we prepare?

In this episode, Chris talks about strategies for school refusal intervention with Dr. Paul Barbato, Director of Special Services in Dumont, NJ Public Schools. Dr. Barbato is also an Adjunct Professor at three NJ colleges and holds leadership positions in several key NJ educational organizations.

Highlights include:

• How to identify students at risk before the school refusal behavior becomes entrenched
• Who should be included on a multidisciplinary team to address school refusal
• Ideas for a three-tier intervention plan: school-level, targeted groups, and individual supports
• How to get started and where to focus your efforts first