School Counselor Perspectives on Implementing a Modular Treatment for Youth

ABSTRACT

Despite great advancements in the development of evidence-based treatments (EBTs) for youth mental health problems, few EBTs have been adopted by or successfully implemented in schools. This is of concern, as schools are the most common entry point for youth mental health services. Modular psychotherapies may be a particularly good fit for the school context given their flexible nature. This study examined the experiences of school counselors implementing of a modular therapy. School counselors (n = 20) were recruited from a larger randomized controlled effectiveness trial in five school districts. Counselors participated in semi-structured interviews, and content analysis was used to elucidate barriers and facilitators to successful implementation of the protocol. Barriers and facilitators fell into four broad categories, consistent with the Consolidated Framework for Implementation Research: (1) intervention components, (2) school setting, (3) school counselors, and (4) study-specific processes. School counselors generally found the flexible nature of the protocol to be a good fit for their students and emphasized the benefits of training and ongoing consultation. Counselors highlighted many logistical barriers specific to the school counseling setting (e.g., lack of time, space, and competing job demands). Findings underscore the need for the development, testing, and implementation of brief and flexible mental health treatments that are tailored through school stakeholder engagement.

KEYWORDS:

• School mental health
• modular psychotherapy
• implementation
• children
• adolescents
• evidence-based treatments

Acknowledgments

We are grateful to Alexis Jankowski, McKenzie Sheridan, and Gabi Kaufman for their valuable help with this article and to the school counselors who participated in this research.

Disclosure statement

J. R. Weisz receives royalties for some of the published works cited in this article. Otherwise, the authors declared that they had no conflicts of interest with respect to their authorship or the publication of this article

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Institute of Education Sciences, U.S Department of Education under Grant R305A140253 and by a training grant from the Institute of Education Sciences under Grant R305B150010. Opinions expressed do not represent the views of the U.S. Department of Education