Support for children and their families leads to resilience and better outcomes.

“Flourishing is determined as a positive indicator of mental health and wellbeing by the Health Resources and Services Administration’s (HRSA) Maternal and Child Health Bureau….Youth who were flourishing were those who always or usually showed interest and curiosity in learning new things, work to finish tasks they started, and stayed calm and in control when faced with a challenge. Rates of flourishing are associated with school engagement and other positive outcomes for youth…..A 2019 study found that the prevalence of flourishing was associated with increases in family resilience and connection, even across youth who had experienced higher levels of adversity such as multiple adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) or lower household incomes. This suggests that state investment in early interventions and supports for parents and families can result in greater flourishing.”

Support of mental health through a formal IEP process should be considered.

Despite a national mental health crisis, less than 1% of students are identified as having an emotional disturbance (ED) for an Individualized Education Program (IEP) “ Only .667 percent of students are identified as having an emotional disturbance (ED) for an Individualized Education Program (IEP). While there was an increase in mental distress among students from 2019-2021,the percentage of students identified with emotional disturbance for an IEP decreased in all states except for Wyoming, Texas, and South Dakota. IEPs are critical for ensuring that youth with disabilities can receive the individualized services, supports, and accommodations to succeed in a school setting. However, without sufficient funding, staffing, and guidance, identification of students with emotional disturbance may contribute to disparities for underserved youth.

Effective support for mental health cannot occur without ensuring quality.

“Nationally, 65.0% of youth with major depressive disorder who received mental health treatment or counseling reported that it helped them at least “some.” Only a little over a third (36%) reported it helped them “a lot” or “extremely.”…While increasing access to mental health care is critical, ensuring people are receiving quality care is equally important. Ensuring access to care means little if individuals do not want to access it, do not want to continue utilizing care because they don’t feel like it is helping them, or at worst, are experiencing harm as a result of their treatment. There are few standardized, publicly available quality measures for mental health care. According to a 2021 environmental scan of quality measures by the National Committee for Quality Assurance (NCQA), most federal programs rely on process or non-standardized quality measures. The most frequently used quality measures across programs were screening for depression and follow-up, follow-up after hospitalization for mental illness, and initiation and engagement of alcohol and other drug abuse treatment. These are all process measures, and do not include whether the individual felt that they received quality care or that it helped them. Quality measures should be codesigned with individuals with lived experience of mental health conditions to adequately capture what is meaningful to people receiving care. State mental health agencies should also include measures of patient experience data, including both inpatient and outpatient treatment experiences, as part of their quality measurement and reporting, and should use this data to increase the accountability of plans and providers licensed to operate in the state.