“Building on our existing efforts to address the mental health needs of New Jersey students has never been more important, as countless young people across the state – and the nation – face mental health challenges that have been exacerbated by the turbulence. of recent years. Murphy said in a statement. “Implementing this new model of mental health support will allow us to reach more students and offer them the evidence-based resources and services they need.”
But some local superintendents and school employees who have run school mental health programs in their buildings for years say they were not consulted when the NJ4S system was being developed and that the loss of funding for their current programs will devastate thousands of students.
“This was an intentional, targeted ambush with no chance of involvement, no chance of providing information,” said South Brunswick Superintendent Scott Feder, who runs one of the largest school programs in the state.
According to DCF officials, the department “underwent a comprehensive stakeholder engagement process, creating a task force that included school leaders, parents, youth, government stakeholders and provider network representatives,” when creating the NJ4S model.
Suzanne Keller, director of a school program at Red Bank Regional High School in Monmouth County, said she is “devastated” by the news that her program will be eliminated by the end of the school year.
Keller said her program, The Source, provides 24/7 mental health care to students, but also provides scholarships, preventative health care, dental and vision care, and operates a food pantry. foods. She and her fellow Source staff have even stepped up to help families with rental assistance during the pandemic, Keller said.
A central model, he said, would not be able to provide the kind of hands-on, immediate assistance his 23-year-old program specializes in.
“Our program builds trust and bonds with students and the broader school community that a hub-and-spoke model simply can’t create,” said Keller.
Rather than eliminate school programs entirely in favor of the NJ4S model that is not yet in place, the state should have tried something to make sure students in crisis don’t lose services in the transition, he said.
The Murphy administration has been seeking to reform the school-based youth service system for years. In 2020, amid financial concerns generated by the Covid-19 pandemic, the administration proposed cutting funding for the program. The proposed cuts drew the ire of advocates and lawmakers who said funding for student mental health programs would be non-negotiable.
The money was eventually added back to the final budget, but some education advocates and local school officials remain wary of the administration’s enthusiasm for changing the system.
The current school system has been in existence since the 1980s and is in operation in some 90 schools, providing services such as mental health counseling, employment counseling, substance abuse prevention, suicide prevention, pregnancy prevention, and sexual assault prevention. .
in a concepts paper Launched with the state’s NJ4S announcement, DCF Commissioner Christine Norbut Beyer wrote that the current school-linked system is “limited in scope and scope” and available to 25,000 to 30,000 students, or 2 percent of the nearly 1.4 million students in New Jersey public schools. system.
Keller said that estimate is an underestimate. Between assemblies, outreach programs, informal advisory sessions with students, and tips given to teachers and parents, Keller said his program has touched “every single student” at Red Bank Regional High School. , as well as the community at large, in some way for years.
Beyer noted in the document that the existing school system “provides significant support to many of the students it serves.” But, he said in the report, it “has not comprehensively adopted evidence-based approaches in use in many other parts of the United States, is not prepared to be scalable to all school districts in the state, and, due to operating models inconsistent, it is not positioned to maximize flows of federal funds.”
The document also references a December 2020 survey conducted by the National Center for Health Care Strategies, a nonprofit group, in which the majority of students reported that they “prefer to receive health support or advice mentally remotely or at a location outside of the school rather than at your school.”
Keller and the school leaders POLITICO spoke with rejected that data.
Jeffrey Moore, superintendent of Hunterdon Central Regional High School, said the idea that students don’t want mental health support at school doesn’t align with what teachers and school counselors are experiencing. He said his school-based program, and many others in the state, have long waiting lists of kids who want to take advantage of counselors and support their schools’ offerings.
“The notion that kids don’t want to see counselors in their school, that doesn’t ring true for any of us here in schools,” Moore said. “Each school that has a school-based program has figured out how it fits into their constellation of supports for children. Painting them with a broad brush and simply saying they are duplicates or ineffective ignores what each of these programs actually does for children. In many cases, they save the lives of children.”
Feder, the South Brunswick superintendent, said reading the concept paper, he was surprised by how little the Murphy administration seemed to know about the current system. He said he finds it disconcerting that the state claims that existing services are not “evidence-based” when they haven’t done any kind of study on the effectiveness of the program.
“The state has never, at any point, looked at, asked about, or seen what is happening in our districts in this model,” Feder said. “Why would you abandon something that you don’t know is effective because you’ve never implemented any measures to assess effectiveness?”
One of the most obvious concerns Feder and Moore shared is that the 15 “regional centers” will not be enough to meet the needs of students in New Jersey’s 21 counties.
Per DCF’s announcement of the NJ4S program, the centers will be organized by judicial neighborhood rather than by county and will be broader than existing programs.
Counselors and staff at the centers “can be mobilized to support the needs of schools, as well as provide services and support in other areas within the community, including libraries, community centers, faith-based organizations, social service agencies, and even residential homes.” . ” and will focus on “promoting positive mental health; teach and strengthen social, emotional, and behavioral skills; and support a positive school climate and staff wellness.”
Those broader goals differ from what school counselors can provide, Keller said, adding that he doesn’t understand how a system of this scope could be up and running by September 2023.
“Who has that kind of infrastructure to write grants, take over, hire people, train them, build relationships in schools, all by September 2023?” Keller said. “I don’t see how it can work.”
Keller said she and other school program operators plan to “fight” to try to save their programs in the transition, but it will be up to Murphy and state lawmakers to decide whether the state budget can sustain both programs.
According to DCF officials, each of the 15 centers will cost an average of $3.1 million to $3.2 million to operate, for a total of about $48 million each year.
The state’s FY23 budget set aside $6.5 million in federal funds from the American Rescue Plan to build “a statewide data infrastructure network,” and Murphy, in his statement announcing the NJ4S program, pledged to allocate $8 An additional .5 million in ARP funds “to support a robust start-up of hubs with the necessary staff and programming from the start.”
The current school system operates on about $30 million in state and federal funds.
With the future of school programs in limbo, Keller, Moore and Feder said despite their concerns, they support the intentions behind the NJ4S program and hope it gets off the ground in time to serve all New Jersey students in need. .
“At the end of the day, of course, that is my hope that all students have access and that no child misses an opportunity if they need counseling,” Keller said. “I just don’t see how it’s going to happen like that.”
Assemblywoman Mila Jasey (D-Essex), a top lawmaker working to restore funding to the school program the last time the proposed budget cuts were introduced, said in a statement to POLITICO that she has “serious concerns” about the administration. from Murphy. She plans and “has already requested legislation that statutorily preserves this critical program.”
“This cannot and should not be a one-size-fits-all model, and neither regionalization nor a countywide-based engagement is appropriate. Students should be reached in their own schools where they feel comfortable and receive a host of other related services designed specifically for them,” Jasey said. “It is an understatement on my part to say that I believe the SBYSP, as currently constituted, is one of our most effective and successful programs and I am committed to doing everything in my power to ensure it remains in its current form. ”.
