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Project Tag: Children and Youth

Collaborative Problem Solving: Empowering Families & Enhancing Child-Serving Systems

SUMMARY – The Meadows Institute, in partnership with Think:Kids, is expanding the impact of Collaborative Problem Solving® across Texas and offering no-cost trainings to child and family-serving professionals. This evidence-based, trauma-informed approach helps children build skills in problem-solving, flexibility, and frustration tolerance, while also strengthening relationships and reducing challenging behaviors. Registration is live for our upcoming training opportunity.

Children and Youth Collaborative Problem Solving Trauma-Informed Care

Strategies for Increasing Access to Quality Mental Health Care for Children and Youth in Colorado

Summary – With generous support from the Penner Family Foundation, the Meadows Mental Health Policy Institute conducted a comprehensive analysis of Colorado’s child and youth mental health landscape. This strategic analysis of existing and potentially impactful levers across policy, philanthropy, and industry — as well as opportunities for transformational investment — spotlights the vital work of organizations across the state, identifies existing challenges and obstacles, and pinpoints promising opportunities for improving mental health resources and support for Colorado’s children and youth across public and private sectors.

System Transformation Children and Youth Philanthropy Schools and Education

Minding College Minds Inaugural Learning Community

The Meadows Mental Health Policy Institute launched the first-ever Minding College Minds™ Learning Community for Texas community colleges, offered in partnership with the Texas Success Center. Through participation in this learning community, thirteen community colleges will develop a comprehensive postsecondary mental health action plan for their system using the Minding College Minds Postsecondary Mental Health Framework.

Children and Youth Multi-Tiered System of Supports Schools and Education

Minding College Minds: Supporting Mental Health in Postsecondary Settings

The Meadows Institute is a trusted partner and resource for postsecondary institutions in mental health policy and practice. Drawing from our extensive experience at the intersection of community and policy work, we bring a comprehensive, multi-systems perspective to addressing mental health needs in postsecondary settings.

Children and Youth Multi-Tiered System of Supports Schools and Education

Uvalde Region Mental Health Needs Assessment

SUMMARY – In the wake of a deadly school shooting that rocked the community of Uvalde, Texas and the entire country on May 24, 2022, Uvalde has demonstrated remarkable courage and resilience. However, the course of Uvalde’s recovery will be measured in years, if not decades. We were honored to be invited to perform a regional mental health needs assessment and be part of the community’s efforts to rebuild.

Children and Youth Grief Trauma Uvalde

Improving Outcomes for Former Foster Children

SUMMARY – Young people formerly in foster care are diagnosed with Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder at four times the rate of the general adult population and often struggle in school. The Meadows Institute worked to address the intersection of mental health and educational and vocational attainment for these important young Texans.

Children and Youth Foster Care PTSD

Behavioral Health Integration and Guidance Initiative

SUMMARY – The Meadows Institute partnered with Children’s Health, a top-rated children’s hospital in North Texas, to train pediatric health care providers to detect and treat mild-to-moderate behavioral health conditions such as anxiety, stress and depression in the primary care setting, so providers can address issues long before they escalate to a crisis point.

Children and Youth Collaborative Care Integrated Care

San Antonio School Mental Health Executive Learning Community

SUMMARY – A year-long learning community for leaders in seven San Antonio school districts. Members have access to expert-facilitated group learning experiences and cultivated workshops anchored in evidence-based practices to accelerate their ability to develop, implement, and sustain their comprehensive school mental health systems.

Children and Youth Multi-Tiered System of Supports Schools and Education

Tarrant County Area School Mental Health Executive Learning Community

SUMMARY – A year-long learning community for leaders in 13 Tarrant County school districts. Members have access to expert facilitated group learning experiences and cultivated workshops anchored in evidence-based practices to accelerate their ability to develop, implement, and sustain comprehensive school mental health systems.

Children and Youth Multi-Tiered System of Supports Schools and Education

Advancing School Safety & Student Wellness Executive Learning Community

SUMMARY – A year-long learning community for leaders in nine North Texas school districts. Members have access to expert-facilitated group learning experiences and cultivated workshops anchored in evidence-based practices to promote safe schools and student well-being.

Children and Youth Multi-Tiered System of Supports Schools and Education

Northeast Texas School Mental Health Executive Learning Community

SUMMARY – A year-long learning community for leaders in 23 Northeast Texas school districts and three community colleges . Members have access to expert-facilitated group learning experiences and cultivated workshops anchored in evidence-based practices to accelerate their ability to develop, implement, and sustain their comprehensive school mental health systems.

Children and Youth Multi-Tiered System of Supports Schools and Education

Trellis Foundation Postsecondary Mental Health & Wellbeing Learning Community

This first-of-its-kind, two-year collaborative for innovative institutions of higher education in Texas is reshaping how they support student and staff mental health. Made possible by the Trellis Foundation, the Learning Community aims to improve student outcomes and increase understanding of mental health and well-being needs within participating institutions.

Children and Youth Multi-Tiered System of Supports Schools and Education

North Texas School Mental Health Executive Learning Community

SUMMARY — A year-long premier learning experience for leaders in 19 North Texas school districts. Learning Community members have access to expert consultation from Meadows Institute staff, monthly best-in-class group learning experiences, and cultivated workshop collaboration to accelerate their ability to develop and implement comprehensive school mental health plans districtwide.

Children and Youth Multi-Tiered System of Supports Schools and Education

Region 4 Education Service Center Partnership

SUMMARY – In 2020, The Hackett Center for Mental Health partnered with Region 4 Education Service Center (ESC) to develop an Emotional Wellness Strategic Implementation Framework and a Mental Health Needs Dashboard to examine and prioritize the needs of the 1.2 million students in the largest ESC in Texas.

Children and Youth Education Multi-Tiered System of Supports

MST Payment Options for Harris County Juvenile Probation Department

SUMMARY – This report outlines ways the Harris County Juvenile Probation Department could expand its Multisystemic Therapy (MST) services by obtaining Medicaid revenues for eligible youth who are accessing the program. MST is an evidence-based, intensive, home- and community-based program designed to better serve youth and improve family functioning.

Children and Youth Justice & Health

Fostering Resiliency in the Aftermath of COVID-19: the Boys & Girls Clubs of Greater Houston

The Hackett Center for Mental Health was asked by Boys & Girls Clubs of Greater Houston to evaluate the impacts of COVID-19 on youth in the Greater Houston region, and to provide recommendations about programs to increase resiliency. The final report outlines our findings and recommendations.

Children and Youth Health Equity The Hackett Center

Texas Child Health Access through Telemedicine (TCHATT)

SUMMARY – TCHATT provides telemedicine or telehealth programs to school districts to better identify and assess student mental health needs and provide access to mental health services through regional “hubs” supported by Texas medical schools. TCHATT was established in 2019 by the Texas legislature under the Texas Child Mental Health Care Consortium.

Children and Youth Education TCHATT Telehealth

Dickinson ISD Mental Health Project

SUMMARY – With the support of the Rebuild Texas Fund, the Meadows Institute collaborated with Mental Health America of Greater Houston to train Dickinson ISD early childhood educators on brain science and using a common language for discussing mental wellness, and to work with administrators on ensuring the financial sustainability of the district’s mental health programs.

Children and Youth Education SEL

2021 Speaker Series: Implementing Evidence-Based Practices for Children, Youth, & Families

SUMMARY – Throughout 2021, we welcomed experts in implementation science, evidence-based practices, health equity, financing, and more to help Texas mental health providers deepen their understanding of how to roll-out and sustain best practices in mental health.

Children and Youth Evidence-Based Practices

North Texas Community-Based Care Environmental Assessment

SUMMARY – The Meadows Mental Health Policy Institute partnered with the Texas Alliance of Child and Family Services (TACFS) in 2019 – 2021 to support planning efforts in North Texas in preparation for the eventual transition from a state-administered foster care system to one led locally.

Assessment Children and Youth Community-Based Care Family

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By Geoffrey Melada

APA-2023_Integrated-Behavioral-Health-Care

The Institute’s Vice President of Health System Integration Andrew Carlo, MD moderated a discussion on the application and sustainability of pediatric integrated care models such as the Collaborative Care Model Aug. 5 at the American Psychological Association’s annual convention in Washington, D.C.

Sponsored by the Mental Health Technology Transfer Center Network, the panel featured Carlo and three psychologists from around the country discussing the promise of evidence-based, integrated care models for behavioral health to help combat the nation’s worsening youth mental health crisis.

Carlo set the stage with some sobering statistics: 15 million children and adolescents in the United States have a diagnosable behavioral health condition, and yet many of those youth receive no services at all. Their untreated behavioral health conditions “lead to greater social, occupational and economic consequences over time.”

The ability to see a behavioral health specialist in the primary care setting, such as a pediatrician’s office, reduces stigma and the demand on specialty behavioral health services while decreasing the number of kids seeking care outside of their “medical home,” said Cody A. Hostutler, a pediatric primary care psychologist at Nationwide Children’s Hospital in Columbus, Ohio. Collaborative care, he said, is an “efficient way to get the kids we are serving care and get it quickly.”

In Chicago, Collaborative Care is helping youth with anxiety, depression and ADHD see “significant improvement,” said Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital child and adolescent psychologist John Parkhurst.

But Collaborative Care still needs champions so that more primary care physicians, including pediatricians, will incorporate it into their practices, the panel agreed. Said Parkhurst: “As much as we want to show ‘never adopters’ data on successful patient outcomes, people like a story, an example. That’s what funders gravitate toward, and pediatricians would as well. We don’t do enough of that.”

Read more about the Collaborative Care Model and Meadows Institute efforts to increase funding and expand its implementation in primary care.