Barriers to Universal Mental Health Screening in Schools: The Perspective of School Psychologists

Abstract

Many young people with mental disorders are not identified until some years after the first onset of symptoms and then frequently do not receive professional intervention. One promising strategy to better identify these young people is mental health screening in schools. Despite a growing literature on the benefits of school-based screening, it remains a relatively uncommon practice and little is known about the practices of those schools that do screen. Moreover, the barriers that prevent schools from screening are not well understood. This study reports on the perceptions of school psychologists about universal mental health screening in schools regarding the prevalence of screening; the practices within schools that do screen; and the perceived barriers to implementing screening. Results indicated that screening remains uncommon, with only 14.8% of school psychologists working in schools that screened in the previous 12 months. The most significant barriers to screening related to being adequately resourced to implement programs, and particularly concerns about how to follow-up students identified as being at-risk. Despite this, school psychologists endorse the potential benefit of screening and report being likely to run screening programs if perceived barriers could be reduced.

Impact and Implications statement

• Universal mental health screening in schools remains uncommon.

• The main perceived barriers relate to adequate resources – partly in terms of available time - and to management of at-risk students.

• Despite these barriers, school psychologists see school-based screening as useful for student wellbeing.

Keywords:

• Screening
• mental health
• early intervention
• child
• adolescent

Notes

1 In Australian schools, a Wellbeing Coordinator is a usually a middle or senior management level position held by a teacher with oversight of wellbeing programs within the school.