{"id":49203,"date":"2024-08-30T01:27:10","date_gmt":"2024-08-30T05:27:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/?p=49203"},"modified":"2024-08-30T01:27:17","modified_gmt":"2024-08-30T05:27:17","slug":"the-new-mental-health-checklist-aims-to-support-returning-florida-students","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/2024\/08\/30\/the-new-mental-health-checklist-aims-to-support-returning-florida-students\/","title":{"rendered":"The new mental health checklist aims to support returning Florida students"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

By Trimmel Gomes Florida News Connection<\/p>\n\n\n\n

With mental health challenges on the rise among youths, school-based services have become a critical component in addressing the issues.

A\u00a0new checklist<\/a>\u00a0from the advocacy group Inseparable guides parents and educators to ensure children receive the mental health care they need. The checklist outlines key areas for schools to focus on, such as staff training, availability of mental health professionals, and regular wellness checks to support student well-being.<\/p>\n\n\n

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Rep. Christine Hunschofsky, D-Parkland, emphasized the importance of reducing the stigma around mental health to encourage students to seek help when needed.

“I think one of the biggest things is we have a stigma issue, not just in the state of Florida but throughout the country,” Hunschofsky observed. “I think the more we can do to combat that stigma issue, especially among our young people, the more likely they are to seek help when they need it.”

Hunschofsky has actively\u00a0promoted legislation<\/a>\u00a0to improve mental health services in schools, such as establishing the Commission on Mental Health and Substance Use Disorder and ensuring every district has mental health coordinators to better coordinate care with external providers.

Currently, half of students aged 12 to 17 with depression are not receiving treatment due to stigma, cost, transportation, and other barriers.

The checklist covers training for teachers and staff in mental health, substance use, and suicide prevention; maintaining appropriate ratios of on-site mental health professionals to students; regular wellness check-ins; teaching relationship and life skills; and promoting mental health literacy.

Caitlin Hochul, vice president of public policy for Inseparable, said the checklist helps identify gaps in services.

“It can look like annual wellness checks for all students to help identify warning signs early and get them connected to the care they need,” Hochul outlined. “It can be things like mental health education, which really helps students learn and identify issues around mental health and substance use disorder.”

Hunschofsky emphasized a major challenge in Florida is raising awareness of available resources and when to access them. She encouraged parents and community members to use the checklist to assess their local schools and advocate for improvements. Both Hunschofsky and Hochul agreed combating stigma, increasing awareness, and ensuring access to care are crucial for creating a supportive environment for all students.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Trimmel Gomes Florida News Connection With mental health challenges on the rise among youths, school-based services have become a critical component in addressing the issues. A\u00a0new checklist\u00a0from the advocacy… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":49204,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"14","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","inline_featured_image":false,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"wpai_generated_summary":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"dois","default_image_id":71799,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"_wpas_customize_per_network":false},"categories":[14],"tags":[9593],"class_list":["post-49203","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-the-new-mental-health-checklist-aims-to-support-returning-florida-students"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49203","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=49203"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49203\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":49205,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49203\/revisions\/49205"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/49204"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=49203"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=49203"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=49203"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}