About this poster

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Panel information
Panel 3. Schooling and Education

Abstract

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INTRODUCTION:
The COVID-19 pandemic amplified an existing crisis in youth mental health within the U.S. (American Academy of Pediatrics, 2021). Mental health needs disproportionately impact minoritized youth, and outcome disparities by race/ethnicity persist (Department of Health Services, 2020). Many youth seek mental health support at school, and community providers and families are essential for supporting youth mental health (Duong et al., 2020). Unfortunately, most youth mental health services are delivered in a siloed manner without including families and youth as collaborators, thus undermining efforts to promote culturally responsive care (Hirano et al., 2018). The purpose of this study is to convene family members, educators, mental health professionals, and researchers to co-design a framework to optimize school mental health to center equity, promote anti-racism, and address outcome disparities.

METHOD AND SAMPLE:
Data collection for this qualitative descriptive study took place between 2020 and 2022, which allowed for interpretation of findings within the context of effects of the COVID-19 pandemic. Recruitment occurred in urban and suburban areas of one Midwestern state in the U.S. through outreach to family advocacy organizations, youth-serving organizations, schools, and community mental health. Participants included mental health professionals (n = 17), teachers (n = 14), family members (n = 9), and researchers (n = 11).

PROCEDURES:
Participants engaged in three phases of focus groups. In Phase 1, researchers’ interview coding identified youth mental health needs and areas to center equity and anti-racism. In Phase 2, participants co-designed the framework using the nominal group decision making process (Delbecq et al., 1975). In Phase 3 participants and researchers collaborated to finalize the framework. Community advisors advised on the co-design.

DATA ANALYSIS:
Critical thematic analysis (Lawless & Chen, 2019) was used to identify themes based on participant responses. Trained graduate coders coded data using codebooks developed for this project. Two coders independently coded each transcript. Coders reached a minimum of 80% inter-coder agreement; disagreements were resolved by group consensus. Positionality was addressed through all phases of the project to reflect on biases and discuss coding transparently.

RESULTS:
Themes fell into three main categories, which encompassed a framework for centering equity and promoting anti-racism in school mental health: school practices, training for school professionals, and family–school–community partnerships.
1. School practices central to equitable school mental health: (a) developing school teams that are representative of communities, (b) integrating student cultures into mental health practices, (c) examining policies and practices for disproportionate impact, and (d) assessing universal screening and progress monitoring to identify bias and how whiteness has been centered.
2. Needs for training school professionals: (a) assessing knowledge about mental health and beliefs about social justice, (b) training focused on social justice, (c) implementation action plans, and (d) coaching to center equity.
3. In the area of family–school–community partnerships, equitable school mental health would be enhanced through: (a) using strengths-based approaches, (b) acknowledging and apologizing for harm, (c) integrating youth and family voices (especially those of minoritized families) in school decisions, and (d) fostering family-to-family connections.

CONCLUSIONS:
This study aimed to bring together families, educators, mental health professionals, and researchers in partnership to explore experiences and develop a framework for optimizing school mental health to center anti-racism and equity. Focus group findings included themes related to school practices, training school professionals, and family–school–community partnerships. These findings contributed to development of a framework for optimizing anti-racist and equitable school mental health approaches. This will serve as a foundation for future development of practices and strategies aligned with framework components to foster implementation in educational settings.

Author information

Author	Role
Rachel T. Santiago, University of Missouri	Presenting author
S. Andrew Garbacz, University of Wisconsin–Madison, United States	Non-presenting author
Shannon R. Holmes, University of Missouri, United States	Non-presenting author
Katie Eklund, University of Wisconsin–Madison, United States	Non-presenting author
Steve Kilgus, University of Wisconsin–Madison, United States	Non-presenting author

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