A Case Study: Exploring Students’ Mental Health
The University of Findlay
A Case Study: Exploring Students’ Mental Health
Airin Parvin
The University of Findlay
Background to the Problem
Joypurhat Girls’ Cadet College (JGCC) is a secondary-level educational institution in Bangladesh run under the Bangladesh Army administration. It provides education to girls cadets from grade 7 to grade 12. Here cadets are given general education and elementary military training. The JGCC community consists of girl cadet students, faculties, and their families, and support employees and their families. Currently, 326 female cadet students are living in the college community without their family members. (Joypurhat Girls' Cadet College, 2022)
As the students live without their family members, they require intensive mental health support. Junior cadets require more mental support as they feel homesick. Most of the cadets have the first experience in their lives to live without their parents. Cadets also have to maintain strict rules and regulations in the college, which is also the first time in their lives. Most of the cadets initially cannot bear it. They need intensive support during this time. Besides that, these cadets are going through their adolescence age which is very critical considering psychological effect. Cadets face study stress, exam phobia, anxiety, etc. during their college life. All these issues create huge mental stress on the cadets. Sometimes, cadets attempt suicide for these reasons. Therefore, keeping girl cadet students’ mental health well is the top concerning issue of the community. UNICEF (2021) reported that more than 13% of adolescents aged between 10 and 19 live with a diagnosed mental disorder as defined by the World Health Organization. Among them, 77 million adolescents are girls aged 10–19 who live with a mental disorder. So, it is worldwide proven that a significant portion of adolescent girls have mental health issues, and JGCC is no exception, as all students are adolescents. Though this mental health issue is concerning, the college has no mental health specialist or counselor, as the situation is also worse at the national level. Hasan et al. (2021) explored that the lack of public mental health facilities, scarcity of skilled mental health professionals, insufficient financial resource distribution, inadequately stewarded mental health policies, and stigma contribute to making current mental healthcare significantly inadequate in Bangladesh. Most mental health professionals are located in urban areas, so people in rural areas like Joypurhat have limited access to mental health services. Considering this context, it is clear that mental health issues are one of the main concerns of JGCC students, and support needs to be initiated to address this concern.
Besides, students’ mental health issues have an impact on their learning. It is observed that lower mental health of students is lowering their motivation towards learning and engagement in college activities. It is also evident in many research that students with lower mental health scored lower in academic achievement. Duncan et al. (2021) experimented that students with lower depression and higher psychosocial well-being scores have better grades in both math and language courses, as well as better education behaviors. That is why an intervention is needed to ensure holistic mental health support for JGCC students so that they can better learn and do academic performance. The Problem of Practice (PoP) being explored is how to improve students’ mental health and motivation toward learning.
Learning Community
The learning community that the Problem of Practice (PoP) falls within is the Professional Learning Community (PLC). A well-developed PLC has a positive impact on both teaching practice and student achievement (Vescio et al., 2008). This problem of practice is closely dependent on teachers and their teaching-learning process; therefore, it will be a good platform for them to share and discuss their learning and experiences with each other and help themselves to bring better solutions for supporting students’ mental health. Not all teachers have the same level of knowledge, skills, and attitude. PLC can bring them all to the same page as PLC is result-oriented, acknowledges individual differences, and makes its members responsible for achieving the target (DuFour et al., 2016).
School needs to find evidence-based solutions to develop the mental health support system. PLC provides the opportunity to share evidence and experience-based solutions among the teachers and school authorities. PLC acknowledges both the knowledge and experience of teachers and the knowledge and theory generated by other researchers (Vescio et al., 2008). Therefore, PLC will be a good learning platform for teachers and school authorities to discuss research-based solutions, share their own experiences, and find better ways of supporting students’ mental health that ultimately improve students’ academic achievement.
Focus on Learning/Domain
The Problem of Practice (PoP) focuses on learning because it aims to explore evidence-based ways to help improve the mental health of the students so that they can be motivated to participate in learning and school activities more actively. The POP has two basic parts: one is what school staff including faculties, should be doing, and the other is what students should be doing. Here The main focus is on students’ achievement through improving their mental health, which is connected with teachers’ success as well.
To develop a school culture, staff development, and training is an important initiatives. Teachers and staff can share their learning and experience to explore the best ways of supporting students’ mental health and wider well-being. For example, they can share their learning and experience on how to develop school culture to support students’ mental well-being through safeguarding, mental health promotion, and prevention, inclusion, support for students with special educational needs and disabilities, behavior management policies, etc. (Jessiman et al., 2022).
Collaborative Culture/Community
The Mental Health Literacy (MHL) program is an effective intervention in school settings to support students’ mental health (Zare et al., 2021). This MHL program includes teachers, parents, and students to increase their knowledge of mental health issues. This program works in a systematic process that helps school stakeholders achieve the goal of the program and build an effective PLC.
This MHL program has some steps. First, the program requires an effective curriculum where both teachers and parents can discuss and share their expectations with mental health professionals at school. During that time PLC started to grow. Then, Teachers Orientation Training (TOT) needs to be conducted for teachers who will cascade the training and scale up to other teachers and parents. This TOT will be delivered by mental health professionals. The mental health professional will develop a platform for all teachers not only to build up their capacity to deliver MHL training but also to discuss how a positive learning culture can be developed in a school and how both students and parents can get access to mental health support. After that MHL training will be delivered to students and parents. Students will learn about different areas of mental health. They will also learn when and how to take mental health support. Parents will also learn about different mental health issues and how to support their children. This will help teachers and parents to create a positive support culture for students’ mental health. Finally, PLC needs to be vibrant, and therefore regular discussions will be arranged through engaging teachers and parents. Teachers and parents will discuss, explore, and analyze different mental health issues of the students and take the appropriate initiative to build a support culture in the school. Throughout these steps, PLC will help build a learning community in school, which will normalize access to mental health support and reduce the stigma associated with mental health.
Collective Inquiry/Practice
School culture has a positive correlation with students’ mental health. Positive school culture has been associated with positive child and youth development, effective risk prevention, and health promotion efforts, with extensive evidence for the impact on students’ mental health (Jessiman et al., 2022).
To establish a positive school culture, participatory action research is a good strategy where every stakeholder of the school needs to make a collective effort. Without collective effort, one aspect of school culture on student mental health may be addressed but may miss the wider effects of school culture. That is why collective inquiry and all stakeholders’ aspects should be discussed through participatory action research (Kaluzeviciute et al., 2021).
Besides, discussions among the teachers, parents, and students help to develop ownership of the initiative. Through facilitating discussions among teachers, parents, and students, different issues, examples, and aspects may come out that need to be addressed. Besides, expectations from students and parents will also be explored, which will help school authorities design appropriate initiatives to build a positive school culture.
On the other hand, collective inquiry develops knowledge, skills, and experiences of each other through asking questions and sharing resources and experiences which are important to develop a positive school culture to support students’ mental health.
Action Orientation/Activities
Mental health has a positive relationship with education behaviors and academic achievement (Duncan et al., 2021). Therefore, educators and school stakeholders should give importance to designing intervention that supports students’ mental health. All stakeholders should be engaged in the intervention to make it successful. Particularly, teachers and parents should be aware of different mental health issues and support students so that students get access to mental health support systems (Zare et al., 2021).
Mental health literacy training will be arranged for teachers and parents to make them understand and aware of different areas of mental health (Mori et al., 2022). Besides, a professional learning community will be formed where teachers will be engaged in regular discussion and talk about different mental health issues, share experiences, and explore ways out in consultation with mental health experts. They will share their knowledge and experience (Jessiman et al., 2022). Moreover, a monitoring mechanism will be established where teachers will monitor and observe students’ actions, and their help-seeking behavior. After that, they will discuss their observation in PLC and teachers' and parents' meetings. All the discussions regarding students’ mental health will be anonymous. Regular awareness sessions for teachers, parents, and staff will be arranged to make them aware and bring in a consensus that they will actively engage in the interventions for supporting students’ mental health.
Commitment to Continuous Improvement/Organizational Design
Zare et al. (2021) explored that the Mental Health Literacy (MHL) program is an effective intervention in school settings to support students’ mental health. This MHL program includes teachers, parents, and students to increase their knowledge on mental health issues which help them to develop a holistic mental health support system through developing students’ help-seeking behavior and making teachers and parents provide better mental health support. MHL was also proven as an effective school-level intervention in another study conducted by Mori et al. (2022) where the researchers explored how it improves junior high school students’ knowledge of mental illness, attitudes towards people with mental health problems, and help-seeking behavior. MHL should be provided to all young people as mental illness prevention strategies through the National Curriculum.
Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) has been found effective school-level intervention to prevent or reduce mental health difficulties or promote the mental well-being of the students. ACT is a therapeutic approach that uses acceptance and mindfulness strategies together with the identification of values and commitment. The primary goal of ACT is not to reduce mental health symptoms but to increase psychological flexibility which is defined as the ability to be in the present moment with full awareness and openness guided by values. ACT can be used as a treatment for a range of both mental health and physical health conditions. However, it is suggested that teachers get support from mental health professionals before facilitating ACT to get the best outcomes (Knight & Samuel, 2022).
Developing a supportive school culture is another effective strategy to keep students’ mental health good by creating experiences of safety. Jessiman et al. (2022) particularly mentioned four dimensions of school culture that need to be considered – structure and context, organizational and academic, community, and safety and support. The research suggested considering the interdependence of all these dimensions during developing any interventions to improve these dimensions for the better mental health of students.
On the other hand, participatory action research has been found an effective school-level strategy to advance the knowledge of the school stakeholders to develop a positive school culture that contributes to the improvement of students’ mental health (Kaluzeviciute et al., 2021).
Results Orientation/Benefits
DiLeo et al. (2022) found that students’ academic results have a direct relationship with their mental health status. Therefore, mental health interventions should be monitored regularly to ensure students' better mental health and subsequently their academic performance. The results of the intervention plan to improve the PoP can be monitored to ensure continued improvement and success by teachers, mental health professionals, parents, students, and school authorities. This can be done in different frequencies by different stakeholders.
Both teachers and parents should participate in mental health literacy training not only to increase their knowledge of mental health issues but also to keep the mental health support system functional (Zare et al., 2021). It will help them to make PLC functional and monitor mental health interventions regularly.
PLC will be an active platform to monitor intervention activities regularly. Mental health support activities can be monitored by PLC members, mainly by teachers and parents. They can monitor the activities regularly and share findings in monthly PLC meetings. They will also talk about different mental health issues, share experiences, and explore ways out in consultation with mental health experts. They will share their knowledge and experience. (Jessiman et al., 2022)
Teachers and students’ activities and behavior will be monitored by school’s mental health professional. S/he can prepare a report based on the monitoring and present the implementation status like what is working, what is not working, etc. in weekly teachers' meetings.
Besides, mental health activities will be observed and monitored by teachers. Monitoring findings will be shared in weekly teachers’ meetings and concerning issues will be discussed so that effective solutions can be made. Mental health intervention will be a fixed agenda in weekly teachers' meetings. Moreover, FGD with the students will be conducted by teachers every quarter where students can share their experiences about getting mental health support. Students will be instructed to note down their experience with school stakeholders as well as while getting mental health support. School authorities will also monitor the intervention and provide suggestions to the teachers where improvement is needed. Parents will also monitor activities, i.e., students' help-seeking behavior, access to mental health services, etc., and raise concerns in monthly parent meetings. Besides, mental health issues will be a fixed agenda in monthly parent meetings.
Backwards Planning
Backward planning is a framework that uses research-based ways to solve the Problem of Practice (PoP). It is an easy and systematic approach to designing education interventions considering the outcome of the initiatives (Jensen et al., 2017). There are three steps and five phases in backward design. The steps involve defining a research question, designing assessment instruments, and developing an experimental protocol (Jensen et al., 2017). With the backward design, the PLC will be created to improve school stakeholders’ knowledge, skills, and attitudes regarding mental health and support students’ mental well-being. This helps ensure that time and effort are being given to solving the PoP.
Phase 1
To provide holistic support to students’ mental health, teachers, parents, and school staff need to know about mental health issues, and be positive toward supporting students who feel mentally depressed through implementing positive teaching-learning and ensuring access to mental health support. Moreover, students need to know about mental well-being and its importance, and seek support, when necessary, without any hesitation.
The standard practice of building a mental health support system is the implementation of a mental health literacy (MHL) program in schools for teachers, staff, parents, and students particularly to reduce misconceptions and mental health stigma. It was mentioned in Zare et al. (2021) that developing awareness and knowledge of teachers and parents on different mental health issues supports students to get access to a mental health support system more easily. Therefore, knowing concepts, issues, and the importance of mental well-being through a structured mental health literacy program is a recognized standard that needs to be implemented in school.
The above standard fits very well within the scope and sequence of the PoP. This focuses on developing a holistic mental health support system in the school for students where all school stakeholders such as teachers, parents, staff, and students need to know different concepts of mental health and the importance of mental well-being for better academic performance. Therefore, knowing the mental health of school stakeholders is an important standard to ensure mental health support. The PoP has a plan to develop knowledge of mental health among the teachers, parents, staff, and students as one of the key interventions.
Mental health-related concepts and support skills are needed for individuals such as teachers, parents, staff, and students. Moreover, teachers need to achieve knowledge and skills related to positive teaching-learning to meet the standard (Mori et al., 2022). Currently, there are gaps in the learning of the school stakeholders. There are some misconceptions and stigma among the stakeholders about mental health. These misconceptions, stigma, and learning gaps are barriers to improving the mental health support system. That is why developing knowledge on mental health for school stakeholders is key to improving the situation. (National Center for School Mental Health, 2020)
School teachers, staff, and students are most affected by the PoP as they will directly work with each other. Teachers need knowledge and skills for establishing a positive teaching-learning environment, staff need knowledge to behave positively with students, and students need knowledge to get access to mental health support. Besides, parents are affected by the PoP as they are one of the key stakeholders of the school community. They will know about the importance of mental health and behave with children positively.
Phase 2
First of all, teachers need to know about different concepts of mental health and how to teach and interact positively with the students (Mori et al., 2022). Teachers will be trained in educational psychology and counseling psychology to understand students’ psychology, and how to behave with students during teaching-learning, assessment, collaborative projects, hostels, co-curricular activities, etc. After knowing these concepts and getting positive teaching learning skills, teachers’ traditional attitudes and stigma towards mental health will be changed (Jorm et al., 2010). They will behave with students positively, welcome their concerns to support and get access to mental health support, and apply a positive teaching-learning approach in their classrooms.
Parents also need to know about mental health issues so that they can be aware of their behaviors and actions during interactions with children. Most of the parents also have misconceptions and stigma about mental health issues (Uddin et al., 2019). Their misperceptions create barriers for students to get mental health support. It is really important to make the environment supportive for students at home and also for their mental well-being.
Besides, school staff also need to know about the importance of mental well-being and its relationship with academic performance. They need to know how to behave with students and how to ensure support for students to get access to mental health support. (Jones, 2012)
Lastly, students also need to know about different concepts of mental well-being and be aware of mental health. It is needed to develop their self-awareness to access mental health support. After getting this knowledge, students will be aware of mental health and able to access mental health support systems. (Zare et al., 2021)
Aligning with the PoP, the improvement goal for the school is to establish holistic mental health support for students. As part of the above organizational goal, improvement goals for teachers, students, parents, and staff are to develop their knowledge and awareness of mental health so that they can support and make the mental health support system sustainable in school through overcoming mental health-related stigma.
Phase 3
All the stakeholders (teachers, staff, parents, and students) need to understand basic concepts of mental health, warning signs of mental health conditions, mental health first aid, confidentiality considerations, referral process, community resources, etc. so that their misconceptions and stigma related to mental health are removed (National Center on Safe Supportive Learning Environments, 2021). Along with these concepts, teachers need to know about positive teaching-learning methodologies and how to behave with students during collaborative projects, co-curricular activities, etc. Staff need to know about how to behave with students, how to support students for accessing mental health support, etc. And, students need to know how to deal with stressful situations, how to manage depression, what to do during mental illness, etc. so that they can keep their mental health well and access mental health support easily. (Zare et al., 2021)
Moreover, all the stakeholders (except students) need to change their mindset regarding mental health from a negative attitude to a positive one. They need to take mental health issues positively and willingly help students so that students can get appropriate mental health support. Students also need to change their mindset regarding mental illness from negative to positive. They should think it is normal. They should change their attitude positively to willingly take mental health support from respective authorities. (Lorona & Perrin, 2016)
In addition, teachers need to achieve and apply positive teaching-learning methodologies in their classrooms (Catalina, 2019). Students need to achieve skills to communicate their problems with relevant persons they trust. Besides, all the stakeholders should develop an aspiration to establish a holistic mental health support system in school. To reach the aspiration, they should own the PoP and interventions, and participate actively. School stakeholders should know the impact of mental illness on students’ academic performance (Department for Education, 2018) and ensure that their behavior is supportive and student-friendly. (Jessiman et al., 2022)
However, the unique characteristics of the learning community are a wide range of ages, a wide range of educational backgrounds, a wide range of experience in education, a wide range of technology expertise, supportive leadership, shared values and vision, structural conditions, etc. External perspectives that can be sought are the perspectives of parents of the students, community members, local and state non-profit organizations that are working in the education and mental health area, mental health service providers, mental health professionals, university professors, education experts, and curriculum experts.
Phase 4
Characteristics of interventions that will have successfully achieved learning goals are orientation and training on mental health (Jones, 2012), implementation of the positive teaching-learning process, discussion on mental health issues in different meetings such as teachers meetings, parents meetings, staff meetings, the establishment of a professional learning community (PLC), etc.
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Besides, many research are being used to represent a breadth of perspectives. Research is focused on social determinants of mental health, behavior in school (Department for Education, 2018), school culture, perceptions, attitudes, and knowledge of teachers (Ford & Nikapota, 2000), the importance of teacher’s role and training, effects of mental health on student learning, mental health first aid training for high school teachers, mental health promotion in schools, acceptance and commitment therapy interventions in secondary schools, effectiveness of a comprehensive mental health literacy educational program, parent and child knowledge and attitudes toward mental illness, etc.
However, interventions have specifically been successful in schools that have Mental Health Specialists and/or Counselling Psychologists or School Psychologists or Educational Psychologists, Partnership with various mental health service providers, Ongoing professional development on different topics, Weekly teachers meetings, Monthly parent meetings where mental health is discussed regularly.
Mental health specialists, teachers, and staff can specifically work in some conditions such as professional development opportunities for teachers and staff, positive/constructive feedback from the principal, vice principal, and adjutant regularly, if the professional learning community works very well if the mental health issue is a fixed discussion agenda in teachers and staffs meeting, etc.
There are some professional development opportunities available both face-to-face and online to support school stakeholders. Mental health service providers offer these trainings. The contents mostly covered by these training are mental health and psychosocial support, the difference between health and mental health, psychosocial well-being, psychological first aid, PFA procedure, emotional and feeling chart, possible red flags, empathy, my boundary, how to control emotions, warning signs of mental health conditions, confidentiality, referral process, mental health resources, etc. (Ohrt et. al., 2020)
Phase 5
The standard practice of building a mental health support system is the implementation of a mental health literacy (MHL) program for teachers, staff, parents, and students particularly to reduce misconceptions and mental health stigma. It was presented by Zare et al. (2021) that developing awareness and knowledge of teachers and parents on different mental health issues supports students to get access to a mental health support system more easily. Moreover, teachers need to achieve knowledge and skills related to positive teaching and learning to meet the mental health support standard (Mori et al., 2022). Therefore, knowing concepts, issues, and the importance of mental well-being through a structured mental health literacy program is a recognized professional development strategy that needs to be implemented in school.
The above professional development strategy will support to solve the PoP. The PoP focuses on developing a holistic mental health support system in the school for students where all school stakeholders such as teachers, parents, staff, and students need to know different concepts of mental health and the importance of mental well-being for better academic performance. Therefore, knowing school stakeholders is an important standard to ensure mental health support. The PoP has a plan to develop knowledge of mental health among the teachers, parents, staff, and students as one of the key interventions.
The progress monitoring techniques that will be used to provide evidence of growth are classroom observation of teachers, observation of different mental health sessions with students, parents, and staff, meeting with parents and teachers, knowledge test with teachers, parents, staff, and students, attitude test to explore how teachers, parents, and staffs perceive about mental health issues and how supportive they are. Attitude tests will also be conducted to know students’ perceptions regarding seeking mental health support. Besides, interviews with teachers can be done to know how this capacity development and learning opportunities help them professionally. Moreover, focus group discussions (FGD) will be conducted to know how these learning opportunities help them to support students’ mental health.
Vice-principal will be overall responsible for implementing the program. However, the principal will know the process and approve the activities. Besides, teachers and staff will be responsible for their activities. The vice principal will plan and lead the implementation of this program and engage others like mental health experts, teachers, and staff as needed.
To implement the program successfully, some resources are necessary such as a training room, a budget for training and session materials and mental health experts, and staff time (including teachers, parents, staff, and students), etc. Along with the resources, some critical benchmark needs to be set to check the progress of teachers, parents, staff, and students’ knowledge, practice, behavior, attitude, etc. Individuals such as teachers, staff, parents, and students will receive coaching and feedback through different ways such as mentoring, demonstration, one-to-one meetings, group discussions, email reports, etc. However, confidentiality will be maintained while giving feedback.
Phase 6
Secondary research will be done based on previous years' mental health-related incidents and the country's mental health context, particularly for adolescents. Moreover, learning from different schools and those who are implementing similar initiatives will be gathered. Both the research and learnings from other schools will help to design appropriate professional development interventions. After that, a meeting will be arranged with a principal, vice-principal, adjutant, and medical officer to discuss the necessity of the mental health literacy program and how to implement this in school.
Then, an agreement will be made with “Moner Bondhu” (a mental health expert organization) to receive services in designing and delivering mental health literacy training to teachers, staff, parents, and students. After making a partnership, a training needs assessment (TNA) will be conducted with teachers, parents, staff, and students to identify the training needs of the stakeholders. Then, mental health sessions curriculum for teachers, parents, staff, and students will be developed. After that, teacher training will be started to train all the teachers on mental health issues, educational psychology, counseling psychology, positive teaching and learning, behavior with students, how to create a supportive environment, etc. so that teachers can behave positively with the students during their interactions with them, i.e., teaching-learning, assessment, collaborative projects, hostels, co-curricular activities, etc. (Ohrt et. al., 2020)
After teacher training, mental health sessions for students will be started. The sessions will be focused on mental health issues, how to manage emotions, and problems, how to get support, etc. Moreover, mental health sessions will be started for parents. Parents’ sessions will be focused on the awareness development of parents on mental health, their behaviors, and actions during interaction with students. It is really important to make the environment supportive for students at home for their mental well-being. Teachers will also attend the sessions so that they can facilitate and discuss mental health-related issues during parent meetings.
After all the training, a professional learning community will be formed for teachers where they can discuss different mental health issues they face and share their knowledge, and experience. Moreover, different days related to mental wellbeing such as World Mental Health Day will be celebrated in school. On the other hand, progress monitoring tools such as classroom observation checklists, activity observation checklists, mental health knowledge test score sheets and reports, attitude test score sheets and reports, activity log book, etc., will be developed to monitor and track all professional development activities including mental health literacy sessions. Based on this monitoring, a progress report will be prepared and shared with teachers and parents during teachers and parents meetings. After one year of implementation, an evaluation will be conducted on mental health sessions, counseling sessions, treatment trends, school environment, teaching-learning activities, etc. The evaluation report will be prepared and shared with relevant stakeholders and school authorities.
Phase 7
Different strategies will be applied to revisit and familiarize with the expectations or standards of the interventions. Role play and demonstration will be one of them. Teachers will demonstrate their lessons to other teachers. Mental health experts and other teachers will provide feedback to respective teachers on what went well, and where can be improved. In this way, everyone will understand the standards and expectations they need to meet. Moreover, observation techniques will be used by teachers where teachers will observe other teachers’ classes and fill up the observation checklist. By filling observation checklist teachers will not only provide feedback to others but also understand where s/he/he needs to improve (Baier, 2018).
On the other hand, PLC can be a good platform to familiarize the standard. Teachers will share and discuss their experiences in the professional learning community which help everyone to be on the same page of expectations. Besides, different videos on best practices can be shown to parents, staff, teachers, and students during different meetings which will also help them to be familiarized with standards practices.
Evidence of growth can be recorded through continuous progress monitoring and using several tools, i.e., observation tools, knowledge tests, attitude tests, participant surveys, interviews with teachers, and focus group discussions with students and parents. It is really important to continue the standard practice even after achieving the targeted growth. To continue the mental health support and make it sustainable, a mental health literacy program needs to be included in the school’s regular activities. Moreover, refresher training for teachers needs to be arranged regularly. In addition, mental health needs to be included as regular agenda in parents and teachers meeting. Besides, mental health-related days need to be observed and celebrated every year.
However, the strengths, weaknesses, and implications of the activities need to be communicated to the stakeholders through one-to-one meetings, group meetings, emails, reports, mentoring, etc. Moreover, quizzes, observations, perceptions, and satisfaction surveys of the students, parents, and teachers can be conducted. The outcomes need to be carried out over the period continuously and it is important for all stakeholders for students mental wellbeing and academic performance. It will not be stopped but rather updated based on the updated and refresher mental health literacy training and professional development. If the desired outcome is not reached, further professional development plans can be considered such as peer learning, online learning, etc.
Conclusion
After thorough research, it can be said that there is scope for developing knowledge, awareness, and skills of the school stakeholders which will be the core of the improvement of students’ mental health situation. It was found by Mori et. al. (2022) and Zare et. al. (2021) that, a mental health literacy program has a positive impact on developing students’ mental well-being and help-seeking behavior toward mental health. This professional development helps teachers to conduct positive teaching-learning activities in the classroom and be supportive of students’ mental well-being. Christina et. al. (2020) mentioned that training and supervision increase teachers’ motivation to be a lay counselor and help students’ mental health by incorporating therapeutic techniques into their student interactions during class time and as part of their typical instruction. Their changes in attitudes and knowledge reflected those expected within an “education as therapy” emerging system of care.
However, there are multiple ways to support students’ mental wellbeing. Considering the lack of knowledge and awareness regarding the mental health of the school stakeholders, i.e., teachers, students, staff, and parents, a mental health literacy program can be the first initiative. However, there are more initiatives needed to develop a school environment more mental health-friendly and make the mental health support system sustainable. Therefore, more research and data are needed to develop holistic support. To find the best methods teachers, staff, parents, and school authorities have to be open to learning from each other and trying something new as this impact students learning too. It cannot be fixed within a day rather should be a continuous effort.
Recommendations
All school stakeholders (i.e., school authority, teachers, staff, parents, and students) need to participate actively in training sessions on basic concepts of mental health, warning signs of mental health conditions, mental health first aid, confidentiality considerations, referral process, community resources, etc. so that their misconceptions and stigma related to mental health are removed (National Center on Safe Supportive Learning Environments, 2021).
Teachers need to participate in training related to mental health and positive teaching-learning methodologies so that they can understand how to behave with students during collaborative projects, co-curricular activities, etc. Teachers need to achieve and apply positive teaching-learning methodologies in their classrooms (Catalina, 2019). Moreover, school staff need to know about how to behave with students, how to support students for accessing mental health support, etc. Besides, students need to know how to deal with stressful situations, how to manage depression, what to do during mental illness, etc. so that they can keep their mental health well and access mental health support easily. (Zare et al., 2021)
Besides, regular awareness sessions need to be arranged in school to change the typical mindset of the school stakeholders regarding mental health. Mental health issues need to be added to as regular meeting agenda in teachers' meetings, parents' meeting, staff meeting, etc. so that all stakeholders (except students) can change their mindset regarding mental health from a negative attitude to a positive. They need to take mental health issues positively and willingly help students so that students can get appropriate mental health support. In addition, learning sessions for students need to be arranged regularly to change their mindset regarding mental illness from negative to positive. They should think of it as normal and change their attitude positively to willingly take mental health support from respective authorities. Students need to achieve skills to communicate their problems with relevant persons they trust. (Lorona & Perrin, 2016)
School authority (i.e., principal, vice-principal) should arrange learning-sharing sessions with teachers regularly. They should be communicated how mental health issues impact students’ learning and academic achievement. This message should be given to staff and parents too (Department for Education, 2018) so that teachers, parents, and staff behavior is supportive and student-friendly. (Jessiman et al., 2022)
Future Research
There are scopes of conducting future research based on this intervention as it is not the final and only solution of the PoP. This intervention is related to developing knowledge, awareness, and professional skills of the school stakeholders while there are scopes of improving the culture of practice, motivation, and treatment support in schools for students’ mental health. To make this intervention sustainable and develop a holistic supportive environment in school, research can be done on teachers' and staff's motivation for providing mental health support, the necessity of full-time mental health specialists in school, updating the curriculum considering students’ stress and exam phobia, updating overall teaching-learning strategies, etc. Jessiman et. al. (2022) explored that there are four dimensions of school culture- structure and context, organizational and academic, community, and safety and support those who are interdependent to shape the school culture. It is suggested to acknowledge the interdependence of these four dimensions and design appropriate interventions to improve these dimensions for the better mental health of students. Therefore, research can be done on these dimensions also. Participatory action research advances the knowledge of the school stakeholders to develop a positive school culture that contributes to the improvement of students’ mental health (Kaluzeviciute et. al., 2021).
Besides, there are many strategies to improve students’ mental health in schools. Knight & Samuel (2022) explored that Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) is effective in preventing or reducing mental health difficulties or promoting the well-being of students. Research can be done on this strategy too. As knowledge and awareness raising of the stakeholders is the most recommended and first-line initiative by many researchers, schools can start mental health support through this. However, more initiatives are needed to make the school environment more mental health friendly and make the mental health support system sustainable. Therefore, more research and data are needed to develop holistic support, and continuous efforts of the school authority, teachers, parents, and staff are needed.
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