Education Week - November 27, 2019 - 12

Detecting and Helping Students in Distress Is Daunting Job
and counseling systems?
"It is relatively rare for kids who commit
violent acts or kids who harm themselves
for no one to have thought, 'That kid is in
trouble,' " said Kathleen Minke, the executive director of the National Association of
School Psychologists.
"In my experience, kids themselves are
the ones who can most often recognize another kid in trouble, and that's why it is so
important to build trusting relationships
between kids and adults at school, to build
communication systems so that kids feel
comfortable talking to an adult when they
have a friend or an acquaintance who is in
trouble."
But most students-no matter how troubled-will never become violent, much
less school shooters.
"It can be very difficult; we have to tread
a very fine line between demonizing students who have had adverse childhood experiences and defining them by those experiences and making sure that they have the
support they need," said Deborah Temkin,
the senior director of education research at
the Bethesda, Md.-based Child Trends.
"The vast majority of kids who have
had adverse childhood experiences are
not going to become school shooters, are
not going to become violent, and we have
to be careful not to demonize those with
mental-health issues or trauma for the
sake of trying to prevent these things from
happening," Temkin said.
"That said, I think if we make sure we are
providing support for all students and trying
to create those safe and supportive environments that make sure that every student
feels connected to their school, we are much
less likely to see these things happen."

Safety and Climate Plan
In the William S. Hart Union High School
district, home to Saugus High, safety-planning documents indicate a district that, at
least on paper, had attempted to put safety
and mental-health protocols into place.
It had instituted lockdown procedures,
and most students interviewed on local
broadcast media mentioned having practiced them. It had assembled a threat-assessment team-a risk-management approach to school safety recommended by
the U.S. Secret Service.
And as part of its complement of 80plus school support personnel, it reported
tapping specific counselors to "diffuse aggression, address isolation, and tend to
mental-health needs of our students and
families," according to its most recent accountability plan.
"It's really nice that the district, at least
on paper, is taking all aspects of student
wellness seriously," Temkin said. "We
don't know how it's being implemented
and we don't know whether those resources were fully available."
But districts can do all the right things
and still see tragedy, she noted.
"It has to be stressed that just because
you are implementing programs or strategies to address whole-child wellness, it
doesn't mean that you can't have an incident happen," she said. "I think that is
often forgotten: You can do everything
right and still have a tragedy happen,
which may be the case here. It just means

Sarah Reingewirtz/Orange County Register via ZUMA Wire

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1

Britney Hopkins, Evan Jabbaz, and Connor Nassry, all 16, pray together at a memorial
for two students killed during a shooting at Saugus High School in Santa Clarita earlier
this month. Students will return to school for classes on Dec. 2.

that there were other risk factors involved
that weren't addressed."
So far, authorities have not released information about the suspected shooter's
mental well-being.
In a recent analysis of 41 incidents of
school violence, the Secret Service found
that every single attacker had at least one
major "stressor" in their life.
For a majority of them, that included in
their family life, an area law-enforcement
officers were still exploring in the days
after the shooting in California. Although

... You can do
everything right,
and still have a tragedy
happen, which may
be the case here."
DEBORAH TEMKIN
Child Trends

much is still unknown about the 16-yearold assailant's circumstances, his father
had died two years ago. The Associated
Press reported that, in 2015, his father was
arrested on suspicion of domestic battery.
It was not clear how that allegation was
resolved or if it played any role in the student's overall state of mental health or
motive to shoot classmates and himself.
"We can't presume that just because a
child has had an adverse childhood experience that they are going to experience
trauma from it," Child Trends' Temkin
underscored.
Experts also pointed out that mentalhealth supports aren't just vital as part of

12 | EDUCATION WEEK | November 27, 2019 | www.edweek.org

a prevention effort but also when the unthinkable occurs.
"Those teams, when they are really integrated into the school community, they
will be there long after the cameras have
gone away ... kids are still suffering, teachers are still suffering for years after these
events," summed up Minke of the school
psychologists' association.
The fallout from the tragedy does seem
poised to put a renewed focus on schools'
mental-health systems and how they stand
to complement and strengthen safety programs. In most of the nation's public schools,
robust mental-health supports are rare.
But the shortage of resources for children's mental health isn't limited to
schools, it's a communitywide problem,
Minke said.
"Children are woefully underserved in
our mental-health system," she said. "Typically, when they do receive [services], it's
those that are available to them in schools."
About 20 percent of students face significant trauma, but "trauma-sensitive schooling" is still in its infancy. Roughly a fifth of
students face two or more adverse child experiences according to a recent federal survey. Those can include abuse, divorce, the
death of a parent, and multiple other factors,
and they are linked to longer-term problems
in health, education, and socialization.
Trauma-sensitive schools seek to create
safe, welcoming spaces for all students, include those experiencing the disconnection
and stress that accompanies trauma.
Prompted by federal guidelines, a spate
of natural disasters, and better understanding of the effects of toxic stress, schools are
trying to institute trauma-informed practices. But few comprehensive approaches
have been tried or evaluated rigorously for
evidence of their effectiveness.
Assistant Editor Denisa R. Superville and the
Associated Press contributed to this story.

Student Mental Health
Many students face mental-health
challenges. Here are some key facts about
schools and student mental health that
educators need to know.

* Among adolescents, 32 percent have an

anxiety disorder, according to the National
Institute of Mental Health.

* Among 12- to 17-year-olds, 12 percent say they
have experienced one major depressive
episode in the past year, according to the U.S.
Department of Health and Human Services.

* Among 15- to 19-year-olds, suicide rates rose
by 76 percent between 2007 and 2017,

according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control
and Prevention.

* For 10- to 14-year-olds, the suicide rate has

nearly tripled over that same time period.
While suicide is still relatively rare among teenagers,
it is the second leading cause of death for that age
group after accidents. Homicides rank third.

Scarce Resources
The ratios of counselors, school
psychologists, and social workers in most
states tend to fall far below professional
recommendations, according to an analysis
of federal data by the American Civil Liberties
Union. For example:

* The National Association of School Counselors

recommends one counselor for every 250
students. The national ratio is 1-to-444; California's
is 1-to-682.

* The National Association of School Psychologists

recommends one school psychologist for
every 500 to 700 students. The national ratio is
1-to-1,382; California's is 1-to-998.

* The School Social Work Association of America

recommends one social worker for every
250 students. The national ratio is 1-to-2,106;
California's is 1-to-6,132.

http://www.edweek.org

Education Week - November 27, 2019

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