National Center for Mental Health Promotion and Youth Violence Prevention

Congratulations on your Safe Schools/Healthy Students grant award! The National Center for Mental Health Promotion and Youth Violence Prevention is eager to offer support, information, and resources as your school district works to provide students with a quality education and a safe, nurturing learning environment. We send the newsletter out once a month. It contains important information regarding National Center events; new additions to the Web site (www.promoteprevent.org); research highlights from the mental health, education, and public health fields; and selected grants and events.

On the www.promoteprevent.org Web site, you’ll find Technical Assistance Specialist (TAS) contact information, resources, and toolkits for implementation, sustainability, evaluation, and evidence-based interventions. The Web site can be an important addition to the technical assistance services you receive from your TAS.

Upcoming School-Based Mental Health Teleconference The National Center will host a teleconference on Wednesday, October 11, 2006, led by Howard Adelman and Linda Taylor, co-directors of the Center for Mental Health in Schools at UCLA. The teleconference will address the questions of Safe Schools/Healthy Students grantees around the topic of school-based mental health programs and resources. The Center for Mental Health in Schools at UCLA (http://smhp.psych.ucla.edu/) provides practical tools for educators and administrators across the country who want to implement systems change and improve the quality of mental health treatment within their school system. Dr. Adelman and Dr. Taylor will also discuss their national initiative, New Directions for Student Support. Registration information will be sent to grantees by e-mail. Please e-mail promotepreventinfo@edc.org with any questions.

Mentoring Resource Guide Need information about mentoring programs? We have expanded the Resources section on our Web site to include a Mentoring Resource Guide (http://www.promoteprevent.org/resources/resource_pages/program_functions/mentoring.htm). This page includes an annotated listing of useful Web sites, organizations, and publications.

New Web Feature! Search the Grantee Locator by Evidence-Based Intervention The Grantee Locator (http://www.promoteprevent.org/about/grantee_locator/) has a new search feature that allows you to locate SS/HS grantees who are implementing a specific evidence-based intervention (EBI). For more information about these programs, you can also visit our EBI Fact Sheets page (http://www.promoteprevent.org/publications/evidence_based/).

New Social and Emotional Learning (SEL) Brief The National Center, in partnership with the Collaborative for Academic, Social, and Emotional Learning (CASEL), has released a new prevention brief on the benefits of implementing Social and Emotional Learning (SEL) evidence-based programs in schools. SEL is the process by which children and young people acquire and develop skills that support learning, positive behavior, and constructive social relationships. For more information on this topic, you can also visit our SEL Resource page.

This section highlights just a few updates from the prevention field. Please go to http://library.promoteprevent.org for more news items and resources.

National Health Education Week October 16–20, 2006 The National Center for Health Education (NCHE) announces the theme for the National Health Education Week 2006, Healthy Kids: Creating Safe Communities and Schools. NCHE has prepared materials for schools, parents, public health professionals, and organizations to promote safety, including material from Growing Healthy, Starting Healthy©, and Mind It curricula. For more information and to download free materials, please visit http://www.nche.org/5functions_infoexchange_eduweek_2006.htm.

Mental Health Treatment: Reporting on Concerns of Youth and Their Families Challenges and Opportunities in Children’s Mental Health: A View from Families and Youth (2006) by Sarah Dababnah and Janice Cooper of the National Center for Children in Poverty, examine the availability and effectiveness of mental health services from the perspective of youth and families seeking treatment. The authors concluded that although there are several best practice treatments in place, they identified “service limitations…lack of services integration, fiscal constraints, a weak infrastructure, and a sparse array of services” as major barriers to effective mental health treatment. Policy recommendations from youth and families involved in the study include strengthening policies that promote a strong family voice, strengthening the policy infrastructure, promoting early intervention, and emphasizing the importance of a culturally and linguistically competent mental health system. For more information, please read the full report at http://nccp.org/pub_ucr06a.html.

Addressing Student Dropout Prevention The National Governors Association (http://www.nga.org) released a briefing on student dropout prevention and recovery, Honoring Progress: An Update on the NGA Center Honor States, (August 2006). The report states that nearly one-fifth of students drop out of high school and one-third fail to graduate on time. The NGA encourages states to focus on both dropout prevention and recovery and recognizes the efforts of three states—Virginia, Georgia, and Indiana—for their efforts to keep students on track towards graduation.

The Grant Opportunities page is updated regularly with new announcements of available public and private grant competitions. Here is just one of the listings you'll find:

Title: Healthy School Communities
Funder: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development (ASCD)
Description: ASCD's Healthy School Communities is part of a large, multiyear plan to shift public dialogue about education from an academic focus to a whole child approach that encompasses all factors required for successful learning. ASCD hopes to recast the definition of a successful learner from one whose achievement is measured solely by academic tests to one who is knowledgeable, emotionally and physically healthy, civically engaged, prepared for economic self-sufficiency, and ready for the world beyond formal schooling. Award: 10 grants of $10,000 Eligibility: The pilot grant is open to K–12 public and independent school communities in the United States and its territories, including Department of Defense Schools; Canada; the Caribbean; and the Asia Pacific region. Deadline: November 15, 2006
For more information: http://www.ascd.org/portal/site/ascd/menuitem.c805ffddf572a549a62c2d69e3108a0c/

We regularly add to a detailed listing of conferences and events occurring within the National Center and across the nation. For example,

Date: October 11-14
Location: St. Louis, MO
Title: Healthy Bodies, Healthy Minds: The Mental Health Connection
Sponsor: American School Health Association
Description: Participants will explore a variety of issues surrounding school health, including research-based curriculums, assessments and interventions, mental health advocacy with school administrators, building sustainable services, coordinated school health programs, and community collaboration.
Web site: http://www.ashaweb.org/annual_conferences.html