Post-covid student and teacher recovery and resilience building project - leveraging east BAY agency for children's (ebac) 18-years providing student mental health counseling and family resource…

Post-covid student and teacher recovery and resilience building project - leveraging east BAY agency for children's (ebac) 18-years providing student mental health counseling and family resource supports within hayward unified school district (husd), the post-covid student and teacher recovery and resilience building project builds a sustainable infrastructure for 80 key husd school staff including family engagement staff, coordination of services team members, counselors, and afterschool managers to develop skills necessary to directly support and coach teachers and student-serving staff to 1) identify & address the social emotional needs of dysregulated students suffering from grief & trauma including in-classroom observation & coaching and 2) address their own trauma & anxiety to promote wellness. Students have been harmed by pandemic stress & isolation. Teachers struggle to cope with their own anxiety, address their students' social-emotional needs, while reducing the learning GAP. Alameda county data shows husd families are among the most negatively impacted by covid. Hayward is facing a trifecta of risks to producing a healthy, educated next generation: the pandemic widened the learning GAP for children from low-income communities of color; these children suffered economically and emotionally; and employment shifts post pandemic left schools under-staffed and remaining teachers stretched & stressed. Without resilience, teachers cannot be expected to remain in the profession & persevere through the challenges; while simultaneously helping to address the current childhood mental health crisis. This project is a collaboration between husd and ebac. Husd is the public school district serving hayward, california. Ebac is a 501(c)3 non-profit with 70 years serving the mental health needs of alameda county children and 7 years working with public agencies, regionally/nationally, implementing trauma-informed, system-wide transformative practices. Project goals: 1. Build knowledge & capacity of teachers & support personnel to recognize & address student trauma & grief exacerbated by covid so these students can be connected to services 2. Build knowledge & capacity of teachers & support staff to recognize & regulate their own trauma & grief exacerbated by covid 3. Build capacity of support services personnel to increase families' understanding of trauma & grief so the children's needs are understood & can be addressed with services 4. Expand access to direct service grief-related support groups/workshops to students/ families ebac will train and support key husd support staff to implement mental-health supports for teachers at most schools and to make referrals to grief and other services for families. Ebac will provide technical assistance/training/facilitation to help husd build an internal infrastructure to achieve the goals. Husd staff will participate in ebac trainings such as how grief affects childhood development, trauma informed & resilient classrooms, wellness strategies to prevent vicarious trauma. The project creatively utilizes district staff rather than behavioral health clinicians due to the national mental health clinicians shortage. School staff will be trained to help teachers identify & respond to mental health struggles. The project will increase awareness of and referrals to existing epsdt/ mental health services available for students on school sites and community and school-based grief services for families, children and staff.