CORONAVIRUS (COVID-19) RESOURCE CENTER Read More
Add To Favorites

Anxiety over start of school leads Miami schools to hire 20 more mental health experts

Miami Herald - 7/16/2021

At their meeting last month, Miami-Dade School Board members discussed hiring more mental health professionals to help students adjust after a year and a half of dealing with the difficulties of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Since then, children in South Florida are contending with the Surfside building collapse, the assassination of Haiti’s president and the anti-communist government protests in Cuba.

School officials said these events have increased the demand for mental health services for students and their families.

“We recognize that trauma can emanate from a variety of sources. It can be from the community, from the home. Sometimes, it’s the school itself,” Superintendent Alberto Carvalho said during Wednesday’s School Board meeting. “And, we recognize right now there are many children, and families, in trauma in Cuba and Haiti. And, for those that are here and have relatives in Cuba and Haiti, these children and families can absolutely benefit from resources we have here.”

‘I forgot what normal is’ — how students are dealing with depression, anxiety, a lost year

More mental health counselors in Miami-Dade schools

The nine-member School Board unanimously approved a $13 million plan to hire an additional 20 mental health coordinators to bolster the existing 70-member counseling staff. The price tag also includes the hiring of four administrators and four program specialists to lessen the paperwork load on the coordinators.

Also, $1.2 million will go toward hiring 100 part-time mental health professionals on a contractual basis who will focus on “evidence-based mental health care for students,” according to a supplemental fact sheet provided by the district.

Charter schools will receive $3 million, according to the fact sheet.

The money is coming from state funds.

Carvalho said the part-time help is needed to cover all 392 Miami-Dade public schools because there aren’t enough certified mental health coordinators to hire full time.

“There is a dearth of certified counselors out there,” he said.

Carvalho said the district needs to plan to help children who may come from Haiti and Cuba and become South Florida students.

“We are sensitive to the needs of our children, and quite frankly, some of our employees that have relatives in the Caribbean where these incidents are occurring, so we are ready to assist them just like we are ready, as we’ve said, to provide service to children who as a result of these conditions, may come to our shores,” Carvalho said.

Students and family seeking mental health services from the school district can call 305-995-2273, Carvalho said.

Surfside collapse impacts students, educators

The district was already anticipating a greater need for mental health services for children and families as a result of the June 24 Surfside partial building collapse, where three Miami-Dade students died, as did one former student, as well as three former employees, said School Board Member Lucia Baez-Geller.

“Thirteen students and one employee have been displaced by the tragedy,” Baez-Geller said.

The district is anticipating most of its 334,000 students will return to in-person learning in the fall. School officials expect many of the roughly 48% who had attended class remotely last school year will face significant obstacles as they re-acclimate to the physical classroom in the coming semester.

“The biggest impact to anyone in this pandemic, it has not been the adults, it’s the children,” said Board Member Lubby Navarro, who introduced a separate item, unanimously approved by her colleagues, to partner with area hospitals to address the mental health needs of students. “And, that’s what every journal, if you read, says, and we have to address this.”

©2021 Miami Herald. Visit miamiherald.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.