By Adriana Duarte ’27
Mental health is a very universal issue, just as much as staff shortage is a universal issue as well. There is a wide range of people of different ages, different sizes that suffer with different diagnoses, Mental illness is shown early in most teenagers who are enrolled in high school. Staff shortages in schools have been an issue for many years, some years worse than others but, after the pandemic, staff shortages seemed to become increasingly worse. It’s a very unfortunate matter within the mental health departments in school. Many kids struggle with mental health struggles that can range anywhere from major depression to other struggles such as crippling anxiety, bipolar disorder, defiance disorders, schizophrenia to a hundred other different diagnoses. their relationships with family members and peers. Lots of teenage high school students go through insecurity issues as well. They are insecure about their bodies and their appearances. In most cases, they just need people to talk to. More importantly, many teenagers may not want to tell their family or they don’t have anyone to tell, so then they tend to rely on the adults within their school system for help, communication and comfort etc. These staff shortages do not help students succeed in their journey of curing their mental illness and it must be noticed. This issue needs to be solved.
According to the recent article, “A Critical Lack of School-based Mental Health Professionals,” many schools that have social workers/guidance counselors are still diving into the complex states of mental illness such as their behavioral reactions, triggers that may come out during the school day, the social anxiety that comes to some students and all these other contributing factors to their mental health as students going through their journey in high school. Jeremy Glauser (Chairman of the Board of eLuma) stated, “As the pandemic wreaked havoc on society, the needs started to escalate and we found ourselves having many more conversations about connecting mental health professionals with schools. Nowadays it’s not just Individualized Education Program (IEP) based counseling, but a full Multi-Tiered System of Supports (MTSS) need.” He told the interviewer the awareness of the population with mental health cases is growing in schools. It’s not just IEP’s or Special Education that needs tending to.
The majority of the time, almost all people with mental health diagnoses need someone to talk to at the end of the day. Whether that someone be a trusted family member, a school teacher, a best friend/friend, social worker, guidance counselor, they all need someone. The shortage unfortunately impacts students’ well being a lot and as well as their social well being. In the school setting with large numbers of students, it’s generally hard to get every student with any issue tended to, especially even more difficult for the kids with mental health disorders, to have to play the waiting game just to get the comfort they may need in that moment. In the article, Jeremy Glauser states, “Students often don’t have access to a mental health professional when they need it most and wait times can be weeks or even months in some areas. In addition to staffing onsite providers, schools should consider embracing a hybrid approach where they always staff virtual providers as well.” I personally agree with this statement. Schools must have more mental health professionals in the school environment. My personal experience can even speak to this type of support needing to be made more accessible. In my school there are a decently large number of students ranging from 200-290. I struggle just as much as any other human dealing with similar or even totally different issues.
School environments can be very triggering and upsetting for me during the day and sometimes when I need support (possibly at the same time as other students), it is hard for the two school counselors, we have to tend to more than one person at a time. So that leaves a lot of room for extended wait time whether it be for me or many other students, waiting for assistance. In my school they have a system where you can fill out guidance forms to let staff acknowledge you’re asking for support for any support staff, but there’s always a wait and sometime they don’t get to you until the end of the day and then were forced to have to suffer through our own struggles and anger from whatever trigger/problem we faced, that made us so upset.
Another point that stands out when talking about the struggles and the disconnection between the support department shortages and the students is, the decrease in ability to learn effectively. Kids in school that struggle with whatever mental health diagnoses it may be, may also have struggles with their motivation and passion to learn during school. In the article Jeremy Gauser was asked a question of, “Does the lack of mental health support influence students’ academic performances?” He says, “If a student faces prolonged stress because of homelessness, we provide Shelter and Housing Services so they have relief to start learning. As demonstrated by these examples, if a student also struggles with internalized behaviors (depression, anxiety, etc), externalized behaviors (aggression, delinquency, hyperactivity, etc), or substance use disorders then they will struggle to learn”. As a trained professional, he said it better than any average undergraduate human could. Any student that struggles internally deserves to be able to learn effectively.
We don’t deserve to be punished or made out to seem as if we disappointed anyone when we are simply just having struggles with our ability to learn. Every student in a school should receive the same opportunities no matter what they’re going through, what they’re living situations are like, what color their skin is, as well as the little things like what happens at home or the clothes they wear. Staff at all schools are working there to see every single student succeed. Some student’s won’t succeed if they don’t have those additional sources that they need to survive however many years of school they decide.
The Raider Press 