As part of its annual planning as well as for a major national project on school mental health, CASH consulted CoP members and others about the key issues in school mental health. Please see the attachment below for a report on discussions that were held at a national symposium on school mental health in May 2009.

CASH also asked CoP members and others to complete an online poll as a follow up to that discussion (go to poll on this page). Or, they could click on the Discussions icon in the top navigation bar and add a comment as a new "thread".

The question on the poll was as follows:

What is the most pressing issue in school mental health that you want to know more about?

The results were:

Total Votes: 131

• how to involve educators and the education system in MH promotion - 53.4% (70 respondents)

• the state of current practices and programs in school MH - 33.6% (44 respondents)

• understanding youth mental health problems and related assets - 6.9%(9 respondents)

• understanding youth perspectives on MH and the school's impact - 19.8% (26 respondents)

• Other - 3.1% (4 respondents)

• implementation and sustainability - 13.7% (18 respondents)

• mentoring and peer support programs - 0.0%

• how to make the school environment more positive - 23.7% (31 respondents)

• how to coordinate agency, mh professionals and school services/programs - 26.7% (35 respondents)