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Assessments Up In ’23-‘24
The Lexington School Board received an update on student mental health and options for expanding the division’s mental health resources at its June 4 meeting.
“Covid was a very tough time for everyone, no matter kids, teachers, families, society. Everyone struggled,” said Jason White, director of operations and student services.
“What we have noticed, and this applies to a lot of school divisions, mental health issues have increased,” he told the Board. “Our school is not immune to this, especially our youngest learners.”
Currently, Lexington has two school counselors who provide individual, small group and whole group counseling. They also provide referrals to connect students with resources outside the school system.
Providing mental health support for staff is also important, White explained.
“The other side of that is supporting our teachers, not only in their mental health but to be able to identify students who may be having mental health concerns,” he said.
All division staff have received mental health first aid training through a partnership with Rockbridge Area Community Services.
This training includes information on how to recognize and respond to mental health threats.
“Threat assessment has become a very integral part of assessing mental health crises, and being able to find a way to help students and staff support with that,” White said.
Both Waddell Elementary and Lylburn Downing Middle School have a threat assessment team, consisting of the principal, school nurse, a teacher, a counselor, White, and a school resource officer.
Potential threats are reported to someone on this team, who will then make an assessment, either formal or informal.
“More often than not, it’s an informal threat assessment, to kind of talk to the kid - what did you mean by what you said, what did you mean by the actions you’ve shown?”
Formal assessments are conducted by the entire team and last between one and five hours.
During the 2023-2024 school year, the division conducted six formal and 32 informal threat assessments.
During the 2022-2023 school year, three formal threat assessments were conducted, and though informal assessments were not recorded, White said the number was significantly lower than in 2023-24.
“I know, speaking with Dr. Kesse, Ms. Troise, Ms. Walters, administrative team, our counselors, our threat assessment teams, we did not do anywhere near [in 20222023] what this year we did,” he said.
Though he emphasized the importance of these assessments, White also acknowledged the strain on administrators and staff.
“Oftentimes when a threat is made, we’re trying to determine whether it is a threat. We’re not going to send that student back to class until we determine what level of threat it is and is it safe for them to go back to class,” he said.
However, he also noted lost instructional time for students, the time teachers, administrators and staff spend on assessments, as well as emotional strain of the process.
Moving forward, the division hopes to expand its own mental health resources to better serve students and teachers. White presented two potential options, therapeutic day treatment and a student intervention specialist.
Therapeutic day treatment would involve placing qualifying students outside of the schools at partnering facilities.
This program could be funded through grants rather than from the local schools’ budget. However, state requirements would determine who could qualify for the program, with no guarantee that students the division recommends would be accepted.
The second option presented was a student intervention specialist, as White said, “to do a very similar job as a therapeutic day treatment counselor does,” but placed at one of Lexington’s schools.
This specialist would be hired by the Community Services Board, then contracted to the division, which would need to budget around $70,000 a year to cover salary and benefits.
Though no official action has been taken, White said that preliminary discussions had begun with the Community Services Board on finding a potential intervention specialist.
