As teens struggle to cope with COVID, a program offers help
Partnership connects doctors with schools to address mental health
By the time a guidance counselor at Kingwood Park High School called in August, Yasmine Acosta was desperate for help.
Her daughter’s knuckles were purple from punching walls. Her middle schoolage son had stopped eating, and dark circles had formed around his eyes. Their grades suffered, and they had grown isolated since the coronavirus pandemic forced schools to shut down in March.
“I didn’t knowwhat to do anymore,” Acosta said. “It was so frustrating, it was so emotional. But I couldn’t give up.”
The school counselor told Acosta that doctors with UTHealth could help her children through a new state-funded partnership between medical schools and K-12 campuses across Texas. Lawmakers created the Texas Child Health Access Through Telemedicine, or TCHATT, program in 2019 to help schools better address the mental health needs of their students before more serious issues emerge.
It was part of a set of sweeping changes to school security and student mental health that legislators instituted about a year after a teenage gunman killed 10 and wounded 13 at Santa Fe High School in 2018. Although most of the changes, and funding, associated with the legislation went to bolstering campus safety, tens of millions were set aside to help schools address students who may be in a mental health crisis.
Those services — particularly TCHATT — seem tailormade for helping students
through the pandemic.
The telemedicine program was created as a stopgap measure to bridge the time it typically takes to get children and teens seen by a mental health professional, a process that now takes an average of eight weeks, said Dr. Elizabeth Newlin, vice chair for child and adolescent psychiatry at the McGovern Medical School at UTHealth.
Medical schools across the state have formed partnerships with school districts, which refer students to the program. Those who participate sign on to video calls with a service provider, who can offer medication and other resources with parents’ permission.
“We don’t want them pulled out of school repeatedly, missing instructional time and the situation potentially devolving into a behavioral crisis,” Newlin said. “And we know on the back end of the pandemic and quarantine, there will be more kids with behavioral health concerns.”
Variations of grief
Although students are less likely than adults to suffer serious health complications due to COVID-19, the pandemic has taken its toll on students’ stress levels and academics. More than 10 percent of students across Texas, for example, were not fully engaged in school after campuses closed in spring. With those closures, students lost the stability of the classroom and the ability to socialize freely with peers. Even now, after most local campuses have reopened for in-person instruction, many students still are struggling, Newlin said.
Teachers and counselors are seeing the scope of that impact now with kids on campus. Taking stock of remote students’ needs, however, remains a challenge.
At Liestman Elementary in Alief ISD, for example, teachers normally would refer students to Nguyet “Mimi” Tran if they noticed behavioral changes in the classroom. Tran, a student support specialist with Communities in Schools, typically would walk the halls during the day and pull students she knew were struggling aside for quick check-ins. Although she has been able to restart those efforts with some students since the campus reopened in late September, many have not returned to the southwest Houston school.
Among those she has reached, most seem to be struggling with variations of grief.
“It’s grief in many different ways. Yes, some loss of family members and some have experienced tragic things, but they’re also grieving that school isn’t the same, that they don’t see their friends,” Tran said. “It’s ‘I miss my classmates, I miss recess, I miss lunch, I miss having that classroom dynamic with teachers.’ ”
Teens, too, have struggled.
Amanda Thompson, a Community in Schools student support specialist in Spring Branch ISD, said she saw a wave of students with suicidal thoughts after the school year began virtually in August. Usually, she said, such students do not find their way to her office until the holidays or toward the end of the school year.
“This is unusual for the beginning of the year and even over the summer,” Thompson said. “There’s a lot of anxiety as well as depression, stress — those kinds of things.”
Signs vary by age
Thus far, 11school systems in Greater Houston have joined the program, including Alief ISD, Aldine ISD, Fort Bend ISD, Huffman ISD, Humble ISD, Lamar Consolidated ISD and YES Prep charter schools. Counselors in those districts can refer students to doctors from UTHealth, who can prescribe medications and, with parental consent, connect students with resources.
The signs that kids may be struggling can vary by age, said Jamie Freeny, director of the Center for School Behavioral Health at Mental Health America of Greater Houston.
Younger students in elementary school may struggle to understand why everything is so different, she said, which could manifest in such behaviors as extra clinginess and separation anxiety. Some may become unduly worried about getting sick or scared of dying if they venture outside. Some also may become more isolated, content to watch TV all day instead of going outside to play.
The signs often are different for teens, Freeny said. They may be more irritable and more likely to get angry quicker. Older teens may be more anxious about making up classwork they either miss or have struggled to understand in online classes. They also may worry more about their grades and graduation. Othersmay selfisolate, displaying a blasé attitude while logging on to online platforms and not participating in their education.
Tran said teacher referrals for students’ mental health may be down, but she has been encouraged that more parents are reaching out after recognizing changes in their kids. That allows them to connect families with the resources they need or to start talking to the students about what they are experiencing.
Acosta said she didnot realize howmuch her son and daughter were struggling until teachers began reaching out to discuss their academic performance.
Acosta works full time and has two other children. Between the transition to virtual school and keeping the family’s finances afloat during the economic downturn, she said it was easy to miss the signs of her children’s difficulties. Itwas not until she, her son and her daughter spent two hours talking to a UTHealth professional that she realized the extent ofwhat theywere experiencing. They since have transitioned from TCHATT to another provider, but Acosta said the help they received from the telemedicine program changed her family for the better.
“I didn’t see the signs — I feel like it was my fault because I work a lot,” Acosta said. “If you notice something different in your kids, just see slightest change in their behavior, reach out to the counselors reach out for help.”