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Heed behavioral warning signs, experts urge
YOUNGSTOWN
Educators, students and parents need to be aware of warning signs that students might be at risk of hurting themselves or others, experts say.
Indications of a potentially troubled student include a change in academic performance and social isolation, said Toni Notaro, compliance and evaluation director for the Mahoning County Mental Health and Recovery Board.
Other signs of trouble are a student who gives away his or her possessions, expresses suicidal or homicidal intentions, has difficulty getting along with peers, is truant, sleeps during the school day, or refuses to eat, she added.
Bullying is another warning sign, said Duane Piccirilli, board executive director.
SCHOOL SECURITY
“The biggest advantage we have is the interaction we have with the students,” said Lt. Tom Collins of the Austintown Police Department, who supervises up to eight officers at the Austintown schools and acts as the liaison between the school district and the police department.
“They are constantly engaging in conversations with children,” he said of the officers assigned to the schools.
Collins said he wants the school officers to exude warmth of personality and convey their concern for the well-being of students.
The police officers include two school resource officers, one each at the middle and high school; a drug-abuse prevention education officer and up to five security officers.
The resource officers work closely with the school principals and guidance counselors “to intervene and to try to curtail any type of activity that may erupt into either a criminal offense or some type of disruption in the educational process.”
Besides officers inside the school buildings, a police cruiser patrols the campus.
“Without safety, you can’t have proper education,” Collins said.
With some 5,200 students, the Austintown school district has the highest student enrollment in Mahoning County. Its elementary, intermediate, middle and high schools have been consolidated in recent years onto a single campus.
“If we have a critical incident that occurs at one of the schools, we’re going to lock down the entire campus. Well now, I have five officers on that campus immediately,” he said of the advantage of having four buildings on one campus.
The disadvantage is the concentration of traffic on a single campus, he said.
Metal-detector screening is used only when a credible threat is received, he said, adding that it would be cumbersome and time-consuming to use it daily for all students at every school building.
To calm down disruptive students, “a soft spoken demeanor” is preferred, he said.
“We don’t want to come in with this authoritative, aggressive approach. We try to show that we are humans. We’re not here to try to get into a physical confrontation. That’s the last thing any police officer wants to do,” he explained.
Among the challenges school officers face today is the rapid spread of information, some of it erroneous or exaggerated, via social media; a defiant, anti-authority sentiment among some students; and the lack of reinforcement of the discipline of the school in many children’s homes, he said.
EARLY DETECTION
Notaro said early detection and intervention in the case of a mental illness can help “keep it from escalating into something more.”
“Mental illness is an illness. Any illness that you can catch in the early stages, you have a better chance of a more-positive outcome,” she said.
“Our mission is to make sure that we get into the schools and we readily identify, as early as possible, kids with either mental health or drug and alcohol issues so that we can provide intervention as quickly as possible,” said William Carbonell, the board’s director of clinical programs and evaluations.
The board funds a variety of agencies that promote the emotional well-being of youths, Piccirilli said.
One of those is the D&E Counseling Center on Belmont Avenue, a community mental health agency that serves children and adolescents, he said.
Another board-funded agency, Meridian Services, offers alcohol and drug addiction prevention education in the schools.
The board funds Big Brothers and Big Sisters, which matches adult mentors with children on a one-to-one basis.
Early identification and intervention for at-risk college students also is essential, Notaro said.
“We provide a free service to any student that is at risk” who expresses a desire for confidential crisis mental health counseling, Piccirilli said.
That service, funded by local mental health and recovery levy money, can be provided off campus and without the student’s parents’ knowledge, Piccirilli added.
Local WORKSHOP
At a recent board and juvenile court-sponsored anti-bullying workshop attended by 162 educators, mental health and legal professionals, a representative of Sandy Hook Promise presented her organization’s “Start with Hello” initiative.
Paula Fynboh, that organization’s national field director, explained the program that teaches students in grades 2 to 12 to reach out to their peers, who may be chronically socially isolated, and give them a sense of connectedness to others in their school or youth group.
Another Sandy Hook Promise violence prevention program, titled “Say Something,” teaches students in grades 6 to 12 how to recognize threats of self-harm or harm to others, especially on social media, and urges them to report these threats to trusted adults.
Its training programs for adults are: “Youth Mental Health First Aid,” which helps educators, coaches, bus drivers and clergy recognize signs of a crisis or mental health challenge and get assistance for an affected young person; and “Safety Assessment and Intervention,” which helps people working in schools or youth organizations to recognize and evaluate threats of self-harm or harm to others.
The nonprofit Sandy Hook Promise was organized by family members who lost loved ones in the Dec. 14, 2012, Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre in Newtown, Conn., in which an emotionally disturbed young man fatally shot 20 first-graders and six educators.
Sandy Hook Promise’s training programs are offered free to schools and youth organizations.
Another workshop speaker was Kimberly Steele, academic program director for human services technology at Kent State University’s Columbiana County campuses.
“We want the normative to be noticing bullying when it occurs, noticing the marginalization of students and bringing them to the group and helping everyone feel accepted,” Steele said.
“All staff must be trained, not just in prevention and intervention, but also in how to really address a bullying issue when they see it,” Steele told the audience.
“It has to be a continuous effort,” Steele added. “All the best-practice research says this cannot be a one-time program.”