KINGSTON, Jamaica— More than 500 school professionals in Jamaica’s 177 secondary institutions are to undergo mental health training over the next three months, under the Government’s School Mental Health Literacy Programme.

The $10-million initiative, spearheaded by the Ministry of Health and Wellness, in partnership with the Ministry of Education and Youth, will allow the trained educators, school nurses and guidance counsellors to administer “mental health first aid” to the country’s 21,000 grade-nine students who are being targeted.

This is in an effort to create a curriculum on how to appropriately respond to students’ mental health challenges and conditions, thus raising awareness in schools to improve students’ attitude, confidence and knowledge as well as to reduce the stigma surrounding the common issue.

“School is a fertile soil for developing good habits as well as for bad habits to be promulgated. So, it is natural that we have to start there,” said the Minister of Health and Wellness, Dr Christopher Tufton, while addressing the launch of the programme at the Grand Palladium Jamaica Resort & Spa in Hanover, on Thursday, October 6.

Dr Tufton said that although mental health spans all spheres of society, special focus must be given to the youth. He noted that if mental health is left untreated, society will continue to deteriorate in terms of antisocial behaviour and how people treat themselves and others.

“This Government’s School Mental Health Literacy Programme is to outline very specific types of intervention and mainstream those interventions. We can’t afford any more to intervene only based on circumstances and events, as opposed to developing an intervention,” he argued.

“So, what this [programme] is intended to do is to look at mental health in a way that enhances the holistic being, [and] we have to work on it. We don’t just intervene to cure but we provide mental health support, and that’s what’s going to happen at the level of the schools,” he added.

For her part, Director of Child and Adolescent Mental Health in the Ministry of Health and Wellness, Dr Judith Leiba Thomas, said the programme will, hopefully, yield a closer collaboration between the schools and the Health Ministry’s child guidance clinics.

These clinics are in 11 hospitals and health centres throughout Jamaica and target children who have psychological and emotional issues.