$85M in Federal Funding Pledged to Support Student Mental Health

As students head back into another pandemic school year, the Biden administration has announced nearly $85 million in funding for mental health awareness, training, and treatment.

The funding includes $10.7 million in American Rescue Plan funds from the Health Resources and Services Administration for the Pediatric Mental Health Care Access Program, which trains primary care providers to treat and refer kids for mental health issues. Another $74.2 million in grants is being distributed from the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration to raise awareness about youth mental health issues and train school personnel and programs that coordinate treatment for young people with emotional disorders.

“We know what’s coming,” Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra said while announcing the funding at Children’s Hospital New Orleans on Friday. “The wave of stress, the mental strain, the disorientation and disassociation that so many of our children are feeling today — they’re going to need help, and not just from their parents and their loved ones, they’re going to need help from us all.”

Since the start of the pandemic, emergency departments around the country have seen a proportional rise in children showing up in the midst of mental health crises. Pediatricians and child and adolescent psychologists and psychiatrists have seen more kids with anxiety, depression, eating disorders, and suicidal thinking and attempts over the past year.

And now students are going back into classrooms, a transition that can be “difficult not only for the kids, but also for the families, as well as the teachers, the educators and the systems of care,” says Dr. Warren Ng, president-elect for the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry. “Kids are resilient, but they need support.”

Another program included in the announcement is Project AWARE, which stands for Advancing Wellness and Resilience in Education. The project is distributing $54.3 million in grants to help state and local governments raise awareness about mental health issues among school-age kids and to train school personnel to detect mental health issues and connect students who need help to services.

The final slate of grants comes from the Children’s Mental Health Initiative, which focuses on community-based services for children and adolescents with serious behavioral health issues. Eleven grant recipients will receive $19.8 million in the first year of funding.

Excerpted from “Children’s Mental Health Gets Millions In Funding From The Biden Administration” on NPR. Read the full article for additional details.

Source: NPR | Children’s Mental Health Gets Millions In Funding From The Biden Administration, https://www.npr.org/sections/back-to-school-live-updates/2021/08/27/1031493941/childrens-mental-health-gets-millions-in-funding-from-the-biden-administration |© 2021 npr. Retrieved August 31, 2021

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