By Victoria Grijalva The National Alliance on Mental Illness found that 37 percent of students ages 14 and older who have a mental health issue end up dropping out of school. “We wanted to remove as many barriers as we can,” said Terri Howard, program coordinator for TUSD’s family resource centers. Cost often is an obstacle for students and their families in getting adequate care, Falco and Howard said, but Talk it Out removes that barrier. Many mental health services fail to provide accessibility because of fees that are too high for many or waiting lists to get into programs that insurance might cover. “If you’re in a situation where you have access or your insurance is provided by the state, you have access to a multitude of services through community mental health,” Tashjian said. “However, the wait list to get into those services might be two to three months, depending on which system and what your needs are.” Talk it Out is not only for services for diagnosed mental health issues; students and their families can use the program even if there need is just for one or two sessions, Howard said. Tashjian and Falco supervise the program. Master’s students enrolled in the UA’s counseling program will provide counseling to students and families as part of the required practicum for their degree. TUSD and the UA pooled their resources for Talk it Out. “This is actually happening out of the goodness of everyone’s hearts,” said Amanda Tashjian, director of the UA’s master’s program in counseling. “Space is the biggest thing,” Tashjian said. “The two entities that tend to cost money are supervision and space.” Falco said that TUSD is providing space and time, and the UA is providing personnel in the form of the graduate students. The Talk it Out program was a long time coming. Howard said it took two years to plan, including a pilot program at TUSD’s Palo Verde Family Resource Center. Falco explained that the pilot helped the program work out wrinkles, such as scheduling, and it began with just a few practicum students. “We are just now functioning at full capacity,” Falco said. Full capacity means that Talk it Out has 10 UA counseling students working at three TUSD family resource centers for the year-found program. “Students that we’ve been seeing range in age from 5 year old all the way up to 18 years old,” Falco said. One sign of success, Falco said, is “we’re getting a lot of referrals.” The program is continuing to grow, and Tashjian said they hope it will be a model for other school districts. |
Students enrolled in the Tucson Unified School District and their families can now access free mental health counseling available via a partnership between the district and the University of Arizona in a new program called Talk it Out.
“Mental health is really important so that students can thrive in their lives in school,” said Lia D. Falco, a faculty member in the UA College of Education’s counselor education program.
At nearly no cost to either the school district or the university, Talk it Out will make mental health counseling available to the 47,255 students enrolled in TUSD, as well as to their families, extended families and caregivers, by using the expertise of master’s students in the UA’s counseling program.
Falco, who had a large role in creating Talk it Out, said the goal was to be able to provide accessible mental health counseling to students and families.
“There’s such high need,” Falco said.
The consequences of mental health issues are beginning to be addressed throughout the nation, and Talk it Out is one resource to help students cope with anxiety, depression, anger or other concerns.
“Mental health is really important so that students can thrive in their lives in school,” said Lia D. Falco, a faculty member in the UA College of Education’s counselor education program.
At nearly no cost to either the school district or the university, Talk it Out will make mental health counseling available to the 47,255 students enrolled in TUSD, as well as to their families, extended families and caregivers, by using the expertise of master’s students in the UA’s counseling program.
Falco, who had a large role in creating Talk it Out, said the goal was to be able to provide accessible mental health counseling to students and families.
“There’s such high need,” Falco said.
The consequences of mental health issues are beginning to be addressed throughout the nation, and Talk it Out is one resource to help students cope with anxiety, depression, anger or other concerns.