Mental health services to be reintegrated into Hamilton County Schools
CHATTANOOGA, Tenn. (WDEF)- Three months ago, the Hamilton County School voted to terminate their contract with Centerstone to provide mental health services.
Now, those services have returned.
The work will now begin to restore mental health services inside of Hamilton County Schools.
It will be a multi step process as families look to ensure students receive services once again.
After months of outcry, the school board is allowing five different organizations to provide those services to students after going through a Request for Proposal Process.
After months of outcry, the school board is allowing five different organizations to provide those services to students after going through a Request for Proposal Process.
These are ELU LLC, The Helen Ross McNabb Center, Psychiatry of Texas, and Thrive Therapies Group, and Centerstone
One student, Ada Brennan, said of the lapse in services it was tough, “Because these groups are our lifelines, not our parents, not our community leaders. Ours.”
Centerstone had provided services for years inside HCS until the school board voted against them in August.
They say they are looking forward to re-establishing connections with students who have lost services over the past three months.
Their Regional Vice President, Dan Mansfield, said, “It will take some time to reengage some of those families that we have lost contact with…We may need to collaborate with the school system with the principals and teachers to say here are the families that we have continued to treat over this time. Here are the ones that we had lost contact with back in August.”
He says the next step for mental health providers is determining how the referral process for students will work, as parents or guardians must give their approval before services begin.
This will be done in a meeting between the five mental health providers and the school system.
Mansfield said, “One of my concerns may be that new referral process, and that it may not be as seamless as it has been in the past, but I have every confidence that the process that the school system has set forth can work. I think it will create a opportunity for a lot of collaboration to start those services.”
The school board came to this decision following a review committee of all five providers, as one student came back to the board with the recommendation of selecting all five.
Ryan Jenkins, one of the board’s student representatives who served on the committee said, “That was a tough decision to come to it. It was not something that any of us took lightly, but we feel confident and recommending all five because they all have the qualifications we feel necessary to be in the school system.”
The date of that next meeting between these mental health providers and the school system is unknown at this time.
