Plan laid to hire mental health care workers for Stanislaus schools, with focus on Latinos
Spanish speakers soon will be placed in Stanislaus County schools as mental health care outreach workers and clinicians to fill what local officials and numerous reports call an urgent service gap.
With anticipated federal budget approval at the end of September, Community Project Funding will allow the Stanislaus County Behavioral Health & Recovery Services to hire 13 additional promotoras and five clinicians to be stationed in Stanislaus schools full time.
The county Behavioral Health and Recovery Services will decide where the promotoras will be placed, based on its survey of unmet need for mental health services, said staff for U.S. Rep. Josh Harder, D-Turlock, adding that not every school will receive an additional health care worker.
Promotoras are outreach workers with roots within the Latino immigrant community who serve as liaisons to social services organizations. Some promotoras are paid workers, while others are volunteers who provide basic health care information.
The new hires will specialize in caring for underserved Latino youth through the Mental Health Access Project, allowing the organization to double its capacity and serve an additional 900 individuals.
Harder, who requested the federal funding, said in a video meeting with promotoras on Sept. 8 that he’s excited to see the project unfold as his focus this year has been expanding health care, particularly mental health care services for his constituents.
“We’re putting folks in school districts who can deliver mental health care to our students,” he said.
Talking in late March with Harder about plans for education funds in the $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan Act of 2021, Stanislaus County schools Superintendent Scott Kuykendall stressed the importance of addressing the wellness of not just schoolkids but their teachers and other staff.
Although the shortage in health care workers predates the pandemic, the effort comes as researchers share concern over rising mental health problems among youth during the pandemic.
Stanislaus Behavioral Health identifies need
In 2020, the Stanislaus County Behavioral Health and Recovery Services conducted a program review where they identified the need for mental health care services focused on underserved communities and anticipated a rise in need for those services because of the pandemic’s impact, according to a county report.
But even before the pandemic, mental health was poor among youth. More than 1 in 10 children, ages 12 to 17, had anxiety and/or depression, according to a report by the Kaiser Family Foundation (KFF).
Further, while suicide is the 10th leading cause of deaths in the U.S., it’s the second leading cause of deaths among that age group, with suicide ideation more prevalent among Black and LGBTQ youth, the Kaiser report says. Prior to the pandemic, substance abuse also was a concern among high school students, with 14% of them reporting misusing prescription opioids.
And it remains a concern given that solitary substance abuse, as opposed to social use, has increased among youth during the pandemic, leading to poorer mental health, KFF reports. Harder’s office said Latinos have been disproportionately affected by the pandemic and his staff hopes that through this early intervention, individuals will seek treatment before their mental health problems become more severe.
“I’m so excited to do everything that I can to support the leadership of the promotoras and make sure that (promotoras) are given all the support and resources they need,” Harder said.
This story was originally published September 15, 2021 at 4:00 AM with the headline "Plan laid to hire mental health care workers for Stanislaus schools, with focus on Latinos."
