Social Work Commons^™

The Critical Need For Mental Health Education To Be Mandated In New Mexico's Public Schools, Bonnie L. Murphy

Shared Knowledge Conference

Based on a review of research and best practices in mental health awareness and skills, this inquiry project argues for state legislative policies that would require mental health awareness and skills in the K-12 curriculum. Mental health affects individual accomplishments in every stage of people’s lives beginning in early childhood and throughout the life cycle. Prevention and treatment of mental illness plays a key role in the ability of an individual to cope with loss and develop resiliency and perseverance in challenging times and to make better decisions that improve the individual’s life and the lives of those around them. …

Building Successful P-3 Initiatives: Foundations And Catalysts For Systems Change, Lindsey Brianna Patterson, Beth L. Green, Callie H. Lambarth, Mackenzie Burton, Diane Reid

Early Childhood

Across the United States, there is a growing recognition that early education and K-12 systems require transformative changes to address racial, ethnic, linguistic and economic disparities in school readiness and success.

Prenatal-through-Grade-3 (P-3) initiatives address these disparities by coordinating, strengthening and aligning fragmented support systems for families and children from birth through third grade.

These increasingly popular initiatives:

• Are based on accumulating evidence that standalone early childhood and school-based programs are not sufficient to sustain long-term success for children facing early childhood inequities
• Take a collective impact approach that brings families, early childhood providers, K-12 staff and other partners together …

Prioritizing The Delivery Of Services To Homeless Students Who Also Have Special Needs, Emily Nolte

Education: Student Scholarship & Creative Works

In the United States there are 234,506 children who are homeless and also identified as having special needs within the 2015/2016 school year. This population experiences extensive biological, psychological, social, and academic needs (Black & Hoeft, 2015; Chow, Mistry, & Melchor, 2015; Gargiulo, 2006; Hernandez Jozefowicz-Simbeni & Israel, 2006). Schools face varied challenges of barriers such as properly identifying students and staff and funding issues (Bowman, et al., 2008; Gargiulo, 2006; Hernandez Jozefowicz-Simbeni & Israel, 2006), while families struggle with issues such as time constraints and high stress levels (Chow, Mistry, & Melchor, 2015; Hernandez Jozefowicz-Simbeni & Israel, 2006). While …

Family Impact Seminar 2018: The Kids Are Not All Right: Policy Options To Address Youth Trauma In Massachusetts, Denise Hines, Laurie Ross Ph.D, Marianne Sarkis Ph.D

Mosakowski Institute for Public Enterprise

Family Impact Seminars are a series of annual seminars, briefing reports, and discussion sessions that provide up-to-date, solution-oriented research on current issues for state legislators and their aides. The seminars provide objective, nonpartisan research on current issues and do not lobby for particular policies. Seminar participants discuss policy options and identify common ground where it exists.

The Kids are NOT All Right: Policy Options to Address Youth Trauma in Massachusetts is the ninth Massachusetts Family Impact Seminar. Today’s seminar is designed to emphasize a family perspective in policymaking on issues related to early intervention in childhood trauma, sex trafficking and …

Engaging Data-Based Problem-Solving To Address Chronic Absenteeism Among Prek-12 Students, Amber Brundage

National Youth Advocacy and Resilience Conference

Each year approximately, 5-7.5 million students are chronically absent. Data necessary to assist educators in problem-solving chronic absenteeism are not widely available. This session focuses on the use of two instruments designed to inform problem-solving for PreK-12 students. A description of instrument administration, data analysis and real-life examples of designing and implementing interventions based on needs identified through the surveys will be provided.