Volusia, Flagler school days get more crowded with new mental health training
News-JournalJan 12, 2020
Now that the second half of the school year has kicked off,
"Five hours is a long time," pointed out
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To meet the new requirements in
Principals will coordinate with teachers to pick a date that works for each school, and will be required to return the sign-in sheets to the district office by the end of the month.
In
The new initiative, approved at the urging of Gov.
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Adding more security personnel at school sites has posed its own challenges. Some districts aren't complying as fully as state officials would like as they contend with high costs and a shortage of law enforcement officers. But adding more mental health training poses its own challenges for school districts.
Time-strapped educators must figure out where the new training fits into schedules that include not only academic instruction, but also mandatory drills for lockdowns, evacuations and fires, school-based assemblies and other topical coverage required by state statutes.
"The training I think is very necessary, especially for children to be made aware of what's happening in the environment and their culture, but it takes time away," Cuthbert said. "I think what troubles all educators is the fact that so much of what they ask us to do, we do not have any input with it."
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Thanks to pre-existing requirements for mental health education in the post-Parkland school safety legislation,
The newly required instruction must include awareness of signs, symptoms and prevention of mental health disorders, information about how to access treatment or resources, and instruction in what to do or say to peers struggling with mental health disorders, and specific instruction on suicide and alcohol and drug abuse prevention.
"We are going to reinvent school-based mental health awareness in
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