AHRQ Innovations Exchange | Community-Wide Collaboration Provides School-Based Mental Health Services to Students and Families in Impoverished, High-Crime, Urban Neighborhoods

AHRQ Innovations Exchange Community-Wide Collaboration Provides School-Based Mental Health Services to Students and Families in Impoverished, High-Crime, Urban Neighborhoods

Summary

Alliance for Inclusion and Prevention, a local child mental health agency, along with the Boston Public Schools and several other urban community service agencies, have joined together to develop Connecting With Care (CWC), a school-based, collaborative, community-wide program that provides mental health and other support services to students and their families living in neighborhoods plagued by poverty and crime. CWC is designed to reduce racial and ethnic disparities in mental health access and treatment. The program demonstrates a cost-effective way to support full-time, master's level mental health professionals onsite at each school. Quality of care is emphasized, including evidence-based treatments for trauma and anxiety, and parent engagement. CWC overcomes the stigma of seeking out mental health treatment through full integration of mental health services into schools. An evaluation of the program's impact is currently in process.

See the Description of Innovative Activity section to see updated information about school-based student mental health services and payment for services and insurance assistance; see the Results section for updated information regarding number of children served, finance data, and trauma systems therapy (updated December 2011).