Helping Students Thrive

In recent years, men­tal health has become a grow­ing con­cern among stu­dents through­out the world, includ­ing in our local com­mu­ni­ties. With a focus to help stu­dents thrive, Clar­i­ty Health­care and Quin­cy Med­ical Group (QMG) came togeth­er with local schools to cre­ate Thriv­ing Minds.

Thriv­ing Minds embeds behav­ioral health and sub­stance use coun­selors in schools in Quin­cy and Carthage. In 2022, the pro­gram launched at Quin­cy Senior High School, Quin­cy Junior High School, Carthage Pri­ma­ry School, Carthage Mid­dle School, and Roy­als Acad­e­my in Carthage. Coun­selors with Thriv­ing Minds work hand-in-hand with schools to pro­vide addi­tion­al sup­port for students.

Clar­i­ty Health­care Exec­u­tive Direc­tor Stacey Juil­fs shared, ​“Clarity’s role in this pro­gram is focused on ear­ly inter­ven­tion and sub­stance use, and QMG pro­vides behav­ioral health inter­ven­tions for the stu­dents. With part­ner­ship, we are able to tap each other’s resources and come togeth­er as one. This part­ner­ship acknowl­edges stu­dents’ needs are com­prised of not just men­tal health and not just sub­stance use but both, and more often than not, these issues co-occur.”

Men­tal health and sub­stance use coun­selors work close­ly with stu­dents, pro­vid­ing indi­vid­u­al­ized care for a range of con­cerns, includ­ing anx­i­ety, depres­sion, sub­stance use, and behav­ioral chal­lenges. This inte­gra­tion of men­tal health and sub­stance use sup­port with­in schools ensures stu­dents receive the care they need in a famil­iar setting.

Har­ri­son Clark and Kian­na Reed, behav­ioral health inter­ven­tion­ists with QMG, work direct­ly with stu­dents on their men­tal health needs, while Alyssa Gar­gus and Izabelle McGee, with Clar­i­ty Health­care, pro­vide sub­stance use counseling.

Rec­og­niz­ing that each stu­dent is unique, Reed said the Thriv­ing Minds team tai­lors their sup­port to meet the indi­vid­ual needs of the students.

“Sup­port for stu­dents looks dif­fer­ent for each one, depend­ing on their need. It could be pro­vid­ing a ther­a­py ses­sion, giv­ing them resources and infor­ma­tion, pro­vid­ing them with a cop­ing skill, or just hav­ing a space for them to process and help get back on track when they are over­whelmed,” Reed shared.

Har­ri­son agreed, ​“With high school-aged stu­dents, it’s always some­thing dif­fer­ent. I have nev­er met with two dif­fer­ent stu­dents and have them have the exact same prob­lem. There is always some­thing dif­fer­ent that helps to keep me ready for anything.”

The Adams Coun­ty Needs Assess­ment con­duct­ed in 2020 showed an increased rate of sub­stance use among local youth. Juil­fs says the Thriv­ing Minds pro­gram will help address this issue while also pro­mote pre­ven­tion and ear­ly inter­ven­tion before the issue of sub­stance use becomes a problem.

“Hav­ing staff embed­ded in the schools offers a unique way of pro­vid­ing assis­tance to not just the stu­dents but also staff and par­ents,” said Juil­fs. ​“School-based ser­vices aim to reduce the bar­ri­er of trans­porta­tion and lim­it the hours the stu­dent has to be away from school to receive services.”

The pro­gram team under­stands that stu­dent men­tal health extends beyond the walls of their school. This year, they will offer Youth Men­tal Health First Aid to par­ents, teach­ers, and guardians, encour­ag­ing every­one to play a role in sup­port­ing young indi­vid­u­als’ emo­tion­al well-being.

“Youth Men­tal Health First Aid intro­duces par­tic­i­pants to the unique risk fac­tors and warn­ing signs of men­tal health prob­lems in ado­les­cents, builds under­stand­ing of the impor­tance of ear­ly inter­ven­tion, and teach­es indi­vid­u­als how to help an ado­les­cent in cri­sis or expe­ri­enc­ing a men­tal health chal­lenge,” Juil­fs explained.

For schools, Thriv­ing Minds pro­vides an addi­tion­al lay­er of sup­port sup­ple­ment­ing the work of school coun­selors and social workers.

“With a pro­gram like Thriv­ing Minds, we are pro­vid­ing an extra hands-on deck for schools, and an extra sup­port per­son for the stu­dents,” Reed said. ​“We are tak­ing away bar­ri­ers, such as trans­porta­tion, finan­cial, and wait­list times and pro­vid­ing ser­vices to stu­dents who may not have been able to receive ther­a­py otherwise.”

Thriv­ing Minds empha­sizes the impor­tance of pri­or­i­tiz­ing the over­all well-being of the younger gen­er­a­tion. Through this unit­ed effort between Clar­i­ty Health­care, QMG, and local schools, the team hopes to empow­er stu­dents to not only sur­vive but tru­ly thrive both aca­d­e­m­i­cal­ly and personally.

Reed added, ​“It is tough to be a kid in today’s world, espe­cial­ly with social media and tech­nol­o­gy; one of the eas­i­est and best ways I sup­port stu­dents, is by sim­ply lis­ten­ing to them, and offer­ing them a lit­tle kindness.”

For stu­dents and fam­i­lies inter­est­ed in the Thriv­ing Minds pro­gram, the best place to start is with your school coun­selor, who can help get you started.