Aware northeast - in the rural communities of eastern washington, current k-12 behavioral health prevention and intervention programs serve only 541 of 92,138 students, and even fewer have access to…

Aware northeast - in the rural communities of eastern washington, current k-12 behavioral health prevention and intervention programs serve only 541 of 92,138 students, and even fewer have access to mental health treatment services. Yet, over a third of students in the region have self-reported feeling nervous, anxious or over the edge or not being able to stop or control worrying in the past two weeks. Even more alarming, one in every four 10TH grade regional students reported considering suicide in the last year. In one regional district, over a third of 10TH grade students not only considered suicide, but planned for suicide, and 21% of the 10TH graders in the same district reported attempting suicide in the last year. All school districts identified for this project have more than 60% of students self-reporting feelings of anxiousness or worry lasting two weeks or more. There are rarely any service providers within the school district boundary lines and limited or no access to public transportation options. The overarching goal of the aware northeast project is to increase school-based access to mental health prevention, intervention, treatment and recovery support by making IT available to the 5,669 students enrolled in six school districts, specifically in rural and underserved school districts in spokane, lincoln, stevens and whitman counties for over four years. Through this project, up to 450 students annually will have access to behavioral health intervention services, and up to 90 students annually will have access to on-site school-based mental health treatment. All 5,669 students in the identified districts for this project will receive universal tier 1 mental health awareness strategies. A secondary goal for this project is to increase educator efficacy and effectiveness relative to trauma informed teaching practices. Through contracting with washington state university child and family research unit, we anticipate increasing the educators exposed to trauma informed practices by up to 692 teachers and other school staff. Over the four years of the grant, 5 new schools will also have the opportunity to engage in a three-year school climate transformation professional development and coaching consultation program called clear collaborative learning for educational achievement and resilience. A third goal is to increase exposure and familiarity to mental health awareness, suicide signs and symptoms recognition, and referral processes to students, staff, and families. This goal will be accomplished by training up to 100 educators to be teen mental health first aid instructors, training up to 4450 teens and adults in teen mental health first aid (tmhfa). Tmhfa is an evidence-based curriculum that teaches teens how to identify, understand and respond to mental health and substance use challenges among their friends and peers. Teens will learn skills to have supportive conversations with their friends and how to get help from a responsible and trusted adult. Newesd 101 will utilize: 1) the three-tiered pyramid public health model for providing supports to school-aged youth to promote wellness (universal/promotion); 2) targeted services to those who need more support (secondary prevention); and 3) intensive services to those who need them (tertiary intervention) directly within the school system is the best method for meeting the needs of students, especially those who live in rural communities with disproportionate access to services.