Community schools approach effectiveness

Clauss-Ehlers, C. S., Weist, M. (2002). Qiildren are news worthy Working effectively with the media to improve systems of child and adolescent mental health. In H. Ghuman, M. Weist, R. Sarles (Eds.), Providing mental health services to youth where they are School and community-based approaches. 

In the last two decades, there has been a large accumulation of experimental evidence as well as of theoretical interpretations of intramolecular reactions. One notes, however, that attention has been focused on the phenomena of immediate interest to the various specialists. As a consequence of the fact that specialisation implies intensification of knowledge on the one hand but limitation on the other, there has still been insufficient communication and cross-fertilisation between the different schools. This situation is well exemplified by the two most extensive reviews on intramolecular phenomena, namely, that of Kirby (1980), entitled Effective Molarities for Intramolecular Reactions , and that of Winnik (1981a), entitled Cyclisation and the Conformation of Hydrocarbon Chains , which present different approaches and apparently unrelated facts and theories. 

The approach developed took into account sociocultural and economic issues, with outreach to all stakeholders - school staff, students, local community, local clubs, and the local and central govermnent. They have all been involved in the process so that they become aware of the risk and support the solution. School building construction was taken as an opportunity to train masons and to transfer simple but effective technology to others in the community, including house owners. 

In addition to established need, effectiveness of approach, and widely shared goals, successful advocacy for mental health programs in schools requires collaboration between the mental health and the education fields. Mental health advocates must expand their efforts beyond traditional mental health coalitions to include a broad-based constituency in order to secure buy-in outside of the mental health field. Unfortunately, too many advocacy efforts have been driven by the mental health community in an effort to force services on reluctant school systems. Such efforts are almost certain to fail since policymakers will automatically look to education advocates to determine priorities for school funding and new programs. The best advocacy efforts, as the following case studies demonstrate, are the product of communitywide coalitions and careful collaboration between multiple constituencies. 

There are several recommended approaches for involving stakeholders in the evaluation process. First, a Quality Assessment and Improvement Team with both community- and school-based participants can be established with the goal of developing and implementing strategies for assessing service utilization and effectiveness. Second, it will be important to involve mental health staff. 

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