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Dr. Cherise Moore and Kathy Hunter Discuss Wellness

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Hart District Governing Board Member Dr. Cherise Moore and Assistant Superintendent Kathy Hunter discuss the District's efforts focused on student wellness both before and after the Stay At Home order.

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Hi everybody, my name is Dave Caldwell, I'm the public information officer for the Hart School District. Earlier on Thursday May 21st the state superintendent Tony Thurmond talked about how the emotional mental well being of students will be our number one priority as we get back to school. And since May is mental health month I have asked Hart District governing board member Dr. Charise Moore and Kathy Hunter the Assistant Superintendent of Educational Services to discuss their concerns regarding the mental health of students and staff, along with providing information as to ways the district is addressing the concern. Thank you both for being here. [Kathy Hunter] - Thank you for having us Dave. [Dr. Moore] - Thank you. [Dave Caldwell] - Dr. Moore, let's start with you. Can you provide some background regarding when and why the Hart District became invested in issues related to Mental Health? [DCM] - Yes, absolutely. Dave, first I wanted to again thank you for bringing this to the forefront of the community. Mental health is a challenge and it's a challenge that we as a community must face together and the first part of addressing that challenge is having the conversation and so as we as a district began thinking about the importance of mental health, for me it was a push to do that because my first year on the board I received two emails too many sharing incidences that we have of student suicide, and, and it broke my heart and it made me recognize even more so at that moment the critical value and importance that we must put on ensuring our students mental well-being, ensuring our staff mental health and wellness just understanding how we have the opportunity really to save lives and so that was the impetus in the push for me is to make sure that I did not get any more of those emails that were informing me that we had lost another student. And with May being mental health awareness month I you know it's important for us to reflect upon what that looks like and and what it means across our country and across our state and in our own community. And people often see mental health as one of those silent, mental illness as the silent disease that's there and don't recognize it, but we have over 6 million children in the United States have that have been diagnosed with anxiety or depression and suicide is the second highest cause of death amongst 15 to 19 year olds. One in five, that's 20%. I have four children so one and five out of those teens at least one will suffer some type of mental health disorder. And as the numbers and the statistics go on and on and in California, those are National, but in California it's even greater, we see that 32% of our high school students at some point shared that they felt sad or hopeless. 9% which is a lot, I know these percentages it's hard to look at them as people, but you'll see some of these statistics on the slides that are being shared here, it is a big deal and it is a conversation that we don't have enough and during this month, especially in the wake of COVID-19 and the isolation, the self isolation that many are experiencing it is extremely important that we bring this conversation to you and share some of the resources that we are putting behind, ensuring a good mental health for our students and our staff. [DC] - So, let's talk about that. You mention that there's twenty-three thousand students nearly twenty-three thousand students in the Hart School District. What Support Services were provided to students and staff prior to the COVID-19 school closure? [DCM] - Yeah, you know, I will tell you that one of the pieces that we did and recognizing this was the something that we wanted to change and have an impact on we really dug a little bit deeper, tried to find out what resources we already had available to support our students and our staff around mental health and mental illness but we also started to look outside to see what was working and what were some successes and other neighboring districts. We came upon the idea of having a wellness center and the wellness center the the purpose of that is really providing a place where students can go to decompress to de-stress. You know, they're carrying a heavy, heavy load. It's different to be a teenager today than it was many, many moons ago when I was a teenager, and even then it was hard, but today's teens carry a huge amount of pressure and anxiety and it was important to have a place where they could de-stress, decompress, have someone a professional, a trained professional to talk to about what those issues are and so pushing that idea and that concept and and working with our amazing superintendent now who was Deputy superintendent then, and really having some cheerleaders and committee to support this, we really pushed opening up wellness centers in our sites and we also pushed you have a Wellness Plan of sorts that included hiring Wellness Coordinator who would help us to take this idea, this goal, this vision from just being something that we talked about to being something that we concretely see that we're acting on in being proactive and in our response. I know Ms. Hunter has a lot more of the details behind that and around that but we opened two of those District funded wellness centers last Fall and in September of 2017 we opened one at Canyon High School and the other at West Ranch High School and they have been received with great, great success because of that, I sit on the WiSH board with you Mr. Caldwell, that became a priority for the WiSH Education Foundation. Wellness became one of the areas in which we decided we would put our ability to get some funding behind and support behind, so that we can have a goal of opening up additional wellness centers. And I'm proud and excited to say that today we have wellness centers or a "Wellness Nook" or "Wellness Corner" in almost all of our campuses and have plans to have them at all. So then again, I want to thank The WiSH Foundation for the help with that, but also the the belief in this being of value of my fellow board members that we put, we put our money where our mouth was on it. [DC] - So let me bring Ms. Hunter into this conversation because what I'd like to know now is what the Hart District has been able to provide in the way of mental health support and services SINCE the stay safe at home order went into effect. [KH] - Absolutely, thank you Mr. Caldwell. And I just would like to Echo the appreciation we have to have a governing board that was able to see the need for students and really take on Wellness as being priority for the district and look at creative ways to get funding. The WiSH Foundation, who is just absolutely raised and enormous amount of money to help make this become a reality for almost all of our schools as we said and then obviously for the leadership of our superintendent Mr. Kuhlman who has definitely led the way on seeing this as being critically important when we're educating children that we're educating the whole child and not just looking only at the academic portion of it. So we have made great strides over time. Some of the things that I would like you to know that we had also already put in place in addition to the actual wellness centers is every single one of our campuses have now a site wellness coordinator which is generally a teacher or counselor who is taking on an extra responsibility and their task really is to have a club of students on campus who are working towards mental health awareness and reducing the stigma for kids for going to get help with any kind of mental health issues because as we all know everyone has mental health, sometimes we're feeling better, sometimes we're not feeling as good. And there shouldn't be a stigma around saying just like "I have a headache today" NO difference in saying "I'm feeling a little sad today" "Feeling a little depressed" or "Feeling a little anxious." And so we're working really hard to get that message through our student population through these clubs. And so I think that's also been a key part of something that's been put in place. We also developed an entire Wellness page on our website that has the wellness wheel that's just full of resources along with several other items that people can check out anytime for any kind of resources they may need whether it's with you know, potential suicide or whether it is with just resources for a family that's possibly going to be evicted, for example, which causes stress for the entire family. So those resources are there actually keep those up to date. Along with that we also joined partnerships with a place called CarePortal.org and Care Portal works with all of our faith-based partners to basically supply needs that our families have, so the social workers that we have working for the district, which we have 8 of them, they go in whenever they identify a need for a student let's say they have a new baby and they cannot afford a car seat, or they can't afford formula, then they just go on to the Care Portal, they type in the need, and then the churches are amazing because it goes out to all of them at once and then whoever wants to pick up that particular need and meet it immediately respond and then they work with social worker to deliver those items that are of need to families. And it's not even always just items, it may be rent that is needed to keep them from being evicted, or it could be "I need a mentor", "I need an adult male that I can form some kind of mentorship with" It's an incredible partnership, and it's going a long way to our Wellness Initiative. So those are things that we had already put in place so I wanted to touch on them before I get into you know kind of what we're doing since then. So, I'll continue on with what have we done since COVID-19. Which has obviously been an extremely difficult time Stressful for everyone, financial problems obviously, for families people being cooped up with each other not having the social interaction that they're used to having, and we are hearing from our kids on a regular basis that this is a very trying time for them. They are experiencing a lot of anxiety and definitely some depression, not knowing about their future for our seniors has been difficult. So our social workers, who are fabulous, created yet another site that everyone can access. What they included in it, is what we developed, what's called a warm line. So instead of it being a hotline, which means I'm in crisis and I need help right now, a warm line is "you know what I'm just not feeling so great, I don't feel so okay right now, and I just would benefit from having somebody that I can talk to, somebody who could just be an ear to listen to me." So we created the warm line for those students to be able to reach out, just to be able to have interaction when we need it. We also developed a resource for families the same exact way it's a line for them to click on and say, "Hey, we weren't expecting this, we now are suffering, and our family needs food, where can we get some at?" And so they can reach out and get help through it, and also we started offering a Wednesday yoga through Zoom, which is open to anyone in the community who joins in, but including our parents and our students. We have morning meditation offered by one of our partners as well. Who every single morning, you just sign onto Zoom and you can be part of that morning meditation. Those are being offered. Our social workers are continuing to allow students to use a QR code to sign up for individual sessions for counseling, and so are our school counselors are doing that as well. We are reaching out actively to kids that we are seeing they aren't as engaged as we would like them to be in the online learning, and so people are making phone calls, doing Zoom calls, anything to have some kind of connection with our kids. I'd have to say I am extremely proud of the position we were in before when COVID hit, so that when COVID hit, all we've been able to do then is just expand upon it and I think we really are offering an incredible array of services to support our families and to support our students while we move through this. [DC] - And, I think it's important-- I was going to say that it's important to note that the Wednesday Zoom classes, the everyday mediation, meditation classes, those are free that you can attend to anytime. Dr. Moore, I want to turn to you now what do you see as the next steps in the area mental health support once the school campuses reopen? [DCM] - Yeah, you know, I'm going to add on just a little bit to what Kathy was saying just before because we know mental health have having a good mental health is more important than ever now and as we talked about the stress and anxiety the depression of students and staff. Opening up, and our plans for the Fall, those things don't just magically go away. We are going to need to continue to provide those supports and you know, as awful as awful as the Saugus tragedy was, I think we learned a lot from that. We learned what supports we can have and should have in place to support our students and staff and we will continue to leverage from that learning for what we do as we prepare for having our students back in the Fall and whatever the learning environment might be that we're able to receive them. You know, I have as I said, four kids of my own and I've gotten a lot of calls from parents with kids were in tears they were stressed and the hospital has had more teams in for anxiety than they could have imagined during this COVID-19 time, So I really think it's important my own child has had good days and bad days during this crisis but really important for us to again use the resources that we have,the wonderful wealth of resources that we have but to focus on reducing that stigma so that people feel comfortable accessing the resources. That's been one of the pushes the wellness centers are amazing and we need to make sure that people are leveraging and using that and all of our other resources who really really need it and a part of that is reducing the stigma. One of the things pre-COVID that I had proposed is that we offer a course called "Mental Health Matters" and the idea behind that was really designed to ensure that everyone is aware of that what mental health is that we all have it as Miss Hunter said earlier, but also to distinguish what are the differences between mental health and mental illness and to help us to be more self-aware and aware of others around us so that we can really start to change the trajectory that you're seeing at one recent said he was staying at 91% of students have felt impacted by some level of stress and anxiety since COVID-19. Again, that's not just going to go away once we open the doors back in the Fall and kids and staff her back on campus, And in fact it might trigger even more stress and anxiety to be back on campus. So us being prepared leveraging those resources making sure that the folks who really need them feel comfortable using them will be one of the big pushes that we'll have, and I know that there's more of that we have planned for the Fall too, but those are some pieces I'll turn over to Miss Hunter add some of the other details to. [KH] - Thank you, and I'm gonna echo what you said, I think one of the biggest things is we have to also have our minds wrapped around where our staff are going to be at mentally and emotionally when they come back to campus because obviously everyone's struggling with this in different ways whether a member of their family has lost a job or been ill or possibly passed away as a result. The fact that they've been cooped up for this period of time, and then the fears that may be associated with actually returning. So one thing we will be doing is a lot of professional development to help support your staff as they move through this and to listen to what they need to make sure we continue to provide those supports and services. We will continue to expand obviously the wellness centers that we're still needing to put in place on a couple of campuses, we will grow the mental health awareness groups and clubs that are on the campuses and I think that we will also probably offer more training in what's called "First Aid Mental Health" and we will try to offer that two more of our staff that are in contact with our students and our staff daily, whether that's Campus Supervisors, Instructional Assistants, Food Services, Anybody who really feels like it would benefit them to have that type of training, and really be there for each other. I think those are the things you're going to see us doing whenever we return. [DCM] - And, you know, they can carry those and I think why the pieces that were going to need to do an addition to some of the professional development for our teachers and talking about courses and clubs helping to ensure that students have a better understanding of mental health and mental illness we're also going to work with our parents quite a bit and ensuring that they are prepared and have tools and tips for what to look for and what to notice and I know you'll see on some of our slides we have some suggestions and thought there that provide a start but we'll be pushing that more through the parent associations on the campuses through our parent education opportunities with with the adult school as well so that we can really help to make sure that are students are supported at home as well as in school with what will be providing them. [DC] - I'm glad you brought that up because Miss Hunter, can you tell us some things that parents could do right now, a lot of the stressors are much greater than they ever were, certainly with COVID-19. What can parents do to help support their teens right now? [KH] Absolutely I think the number one for all parents and actually just all people in general is just listen, just validate what you're teen is saying, don't try to talk them into the fact that ""this isn't that big a deal or "I'm sure you'll be fine" or "you shouldn't be upset about this", just let him feel what they feel and be listen to them, empathize without sympathizing because we don't need to make kids think that they're not strong and capable, able to cope and get through something like this, they are, but we can empathize and know that they're missing out on things. They're missing out on their friends and all that but we don't want them to get into a situation where they feel like, "oh this is helpless" and "it's awful and terrible" and all those kind of things. Physical activity. Being in the house, get out. Get outside in your backyard, ride your bike, do anything. We all know the benefits of exercise as far as it goes to mental health and remember not to look too far down the road, everybody's already worried about what is college going to be like what is this going to be in six months, a year? This as we know changes daily and we just need to take it one day at a time and look at it for the day it is knowing that you could all just suddenly go away tomorrow, we don't know, none of us know, so why worry about it why not just plan and then take it one day at a time and take care of yourself. If you're a parent, you can't take care of your kids any better than our teachers can take care of our students unless you're taking care of yourself first. [DC] - Love that -- that's great stuff go ahead, Dr. Moore. [DCM] - I was just going to echo that really the importance of teaching our kids that this happened, and yes it did, and there's tomorrow, and the sun will still come up and encouraging them to look at this has truly an opportunity where they are growing and ways in which things that come to them in the future, they'll already have so much strength from what they've grown from, that they'll be able to handle other challenges Because they will, we go down the road of life and there are bumps that we meet in that road and this is a big one Saugus was a huge tragedy all of that helps us again to grow stronger and in many ways and to learn how to cope, and that's a part of mental health awareness is learning coping strategies and skills that help you and their difference everyone but still that help you to be okay and the sill okay Bihar district has many resources that are available to you there is a specific page that is dedicated to all the resources that perhaps if you're feeling something yourself maybe your student you know there to check that out doctor more I know that you have a lot of those resources that you wanted to talk about yes you know and I won't spend the time to go through them all in. I'll bet there are a few that you'll see on on the sides that we're going to share with you and are sharing with you they'll also be a reference and leverage again on our website with all of our amazing resources are there but but some speak to the signs to look for as your your teen is dealing with stress how you cope with stress understanding mental health and adolescents and youth and really opportunities during the outbreak to help to address the challenges that are happening for our youth. I know myself one of the places that I want to have you spend some time if you do get to is this month again being Mental Health Awareness Month one of the research that we have from LA County Office of Ed it's the We Rise and it's really a site that's dedicated to helping us understand mental health in Youth and Adolescence. WeRise.LA and it's free virtual because it's happening now this is the annual Month of Celebration that happens in recognition of mental health awareness month and so because of our current era, everything is being offered virtually so you'll find amazing resources and opportunities to really grow and the area of understanding mental health and mental well-being. [DC] - Well, Dr. Cherise Moore and Ms. Kathy Hunter, I thank you very much for joining us today and talking about the social and emotional well-being of our students. Thank you again for being with us. [DCM] - Thank you [KH] - Thank you Mr. Caldwell, appreciate it. [DC] - Thank you very much for watching it. Again, go to HartDistrict.org to look for those resources if you feel that yourself, someone you know perhaps, may need some help. Thank you very much.

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Dr. Cherise Moore and Kathy Hunter Discuss Wellness

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