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03/02/2021 01:01 PMA handful of Guilford High School (GHS) students who claim they have been denied the ability to form a mental health-focused club at the school are speaking out and taking their concerns to the broader community, motivated by the crisis of mental health struggles that has hit young people particularly hard during the pandemic.
GHS seniors Addie Kenny and Kelsey Lynch and junior Abby Moore say they petitioned district and GHS leadership early in the year to form what they described as a student-driven club, which they claim can provide much-needed awareness about specific issues and create important connections to get students help.
“We know we’re not qualified counselors or experts in diagnosing or treating mental illness and we’re not looking to fill that role,” Kenney wrote in an email to the Courier. “We simply are looking to raise awareness and start the conversation about mental health that is so needed right now so that all students feel heard and supported.”
A petition created by the trio urging administration to allow the club had nearly reached its goal of 1,000 signatures as of Sunday afternoon.
Superintendent of Schools Dr. Paul Freeman said he and administrators had heard the concerns raised by Kenney, Lynch, Moore, and others about the creation of a mental health club and related issues. He committed to working toward a solution in engaging students in proper mental health resources, but also made it clear that he didn’t necessarily believe a club was the proper way to do that.
“I think what’s becoming obvious...is that we do have work to do,” Freeman told the Courier. “Not in the way we communicate to parents about resources that are available necessarily, but in the way that we are communicating to the kids. All that being said, we want to be really careful that we are doing this appropriately.”
Many advocates both locally and nationwide have warned the pandemic has exacerbated an already deadly and ballooning mental health emergency among youth, with the CDC observing a 31 percent increase in mental health hospitalizations in youth aged 12 to 17 in a period measured from March to October 2020.
Additionally, at a recent panel hosted by local lawmakers, Youth & Family Services Director Lynne Landry said her caseload has almost doubled during the pandemic as anxiety, depression, and other serious afflictions rise across the board in Guilford. Other families are dealing with extreme financial hardship and even homelessness, according to Clifford Beers CEO Alice Forrester.
According to Kenney, she initially approached administrators early this school year about forming the club. Kenney said she and her peers were told that the district did not have “appropriate resources, adequate funding, or the necessary safeguards” to establish as designed.
The district did form an advisory committee focused on mental health that included some student participation, which school staff has characterized as providing input for many decisions in the district.
Kenney said she felt this body is not effective and is not able to serve as a replacement to a student-led and school-sanctioned club.
“We appreciate the efforts that are being made by the administration, but without honest, ongoing input from the students, many of those efforts feel less than authentic,” she said.
Freeman said that there had been “misunderstandings” about the advisory committee, which he said had an explicitly different purpose than what Kenney and other students have sought in a mental health club, serving as a way to parse through higher-level ideas and solutions regarding mental health, not a venue for students to bring their specific mental health concerns.
“The committee was never intended to be the vehicle...The idea of a club might be only one out of multiple options that get discussed and vetted at that committee level,” he said. “We want to make sure that we have settings that are appropriately supported.”
A mental health club that is run by students and reaches youth directly has the opportunity to directly and powerfully engage teens across the board at GHS, Kenney said, allowing students to guide outreach efforts and craft awareness campaigns that speak to their peers.
“Our goal is to create an environment at GHS where students can educate themselves and each other about mental health, and know what resources are available to them and who they can turn to if they need support,” she said. “We want all students to feel like they can freely ask for help from professionals trained to help them, without embarrassment, and know that they are not alone.”
What the Schools Are Doing
While Kenney acknowledged the efforts of the administration to craft its own plan to reach students and address mental health, she argued the peer-led club effort was worthy of “the administration’s full and total support.”
Giving students the chance to provide input remains a priority in the district, according to Freeman, and he cited work by the School Safety Climate Committee in reaching out to students as well as its participation in the panel lawmakers hosted last week as efforts by the district to meet student concerns about mental health.
Other initiatives within the district this year include increased access to guidance counselors, advisory classes run by teachers, and daily “Drop Everything and Breathe” emails, which consist of mental health tips cobbled together by school staff, according to Kenney.
While some of these are “a step in the right direction,” they fall short of what many students need and often fail to reach young people in a meaningful way, Kenney said.
“It is difficult to ‘stop and breathe,’ especially at GHS, when we are in the midst of college applications and acceptances, balancing relationships with family and friends, and a global pandemic,” she said.
Freeman said he continued to hear these concerns and agreed that the district had an opportunity and responsibility to “meet that need” in some way, though what specific methods or venues for that had not yet been fleshed out, and he reiterated that there were other options besides a club to do this.
“It’s okay to be struggling, and there are places to go to receive the kinds of supports that you need, some that have been in place for a long time and some that may be redesigned or cut out of whole cloth as a result of these conversations,” he said.
Often, Kenney said she and her peers rely on social media personalities, who she said are often extremely helpful and speak authoritatively and empathetically to the struggles that young people are going through. These Tik Tok, Instagram, and YouTube accounts address everything from body positivity to the pressures in athletics and offer a particular kind of “extremely beneficial” resource to young people.
But Kenney said she also knows that even when these influencers are helpful, they are not necessarily a replacement for more direct help offered by clinicians.
“Speaking to a professional is the most beneficial resource out there to improve mental health,” she said.
The idea of students relying too heavily on informal, peer-led, or social media resources “illustrates one of our fears,” Freeman said.
“I worry about pop-up, grassroots groupings where students and only students are trying to have these conversations unsupported by properly trained experts, and oftentimes, from the best of intentions, these groups can be counter-productive,” he added.
When attempting to connect with and identify struggling students, Kenney said she and others observe administrators relying too heavily on grades or other quantitative metrics when assessing whether or not someone is in need of support. She added that stigmas around mental health also prevent some youth from seeking out help on their own, something with which she believes a club could help.
“It is important for the administration to recognize that even students who seem to be okay can still be struggling in some way,” Kenney said.
Though mental health is heavily intertwined with academic achievement, there has been some empirical evidence showing high-achieving students are actually more at risk for certain substance abuse disorders and negative mental health outcomes. One 2020 study found that rates of anxious-depressive symptoms were six times higher than the national norm among high-achieving students.
Freeman acknowledged the district might have “blind spots” as far as the best ways to reach students who are often engaging along different lines, with different ideas and on different platforms than what staff have identified. It was also clear that students wanted a new or different “setting” to speak and discuss mental health, he said.
“Whether or not a club is the appropriate vehicle has not yet been decided,” Freeman said. “We heard the concern, and we appreciate the concern being raised...We are in fact committed to addressing that concern.”
Kenney was explicit that she, Lynch, and Moore understood their role as peer advocates, and while acknowledging the need for professionals and clinicians in the current crisis, argued students have a vital role in leading the battle against mental health struggles.
“We want all students to feel like they can freely ask for help from professionals trained to help them, without embarrassment, and know that they are not alone,” Kenney said.