CRISIS ON DISPLAY
School mental health problem multi-faceted as some complain about not being heard
The state needs to reverse a shortage of mental-health professionals in schools to help improve students’ feeling of well-being and thereby improve performance.
That was a consensus of a rare hearing of the state House of Representatives Education Committee held last Monday evening outside of Lansing and in a room at Sterling Heights High School, attended by about 75 people.
The purpose of the hearing was to gain input so “lawmakers, experts and community members could come together in a location that would be impacted by the topic at hand: the importance of school mental health care professionals and their essential role in school safety,” and so lawmakers “can craft smart legislation that will keep kids safe and support our mental health care workers,” said committee Chair Matt Koleszar, a Plymouth Democrat.
A school-safety bill package
was introduced shortly after the February 2023 mass shooting at Michigan State University in East Lansing but has not been acted upon. The House School Safety Task Force has been working on the issue since after the Oxford High School mass shooting in November 2021. House Republicans accuse Democrats of delaying action.
Following the hearing, a
small group of spectators loudly complained that people who attended the hearing were not able to speak, contrary to what they believed.
Immediately after Koleszar pounded the gavel to close the hearing, a woman who later would only identify herself as “Leanne,” confronted the panel and said, “You said you want to hear from the community but
you didn’t give us an opportunity to speak at all. I thought this was a community meeting. You don’t want to hear from the students? You’re walking away. There’s students here that are wishing to speak and you’re ignoring them.”
Two Republican state representatives, the panel’s vice chair, Jaime Greene of Richmond, and Donni Steele of Orion Township, agreed the session should’ve lasted longer than 90 minutes and the public should have been allowed to speak.
They said preventing that input undermined the point of holding the meeting in Sterling Heights.
“Everything we did could’ve been done in Lansing. Why have it outside of Lansing? Was it a political stunt?” she said in reference to Democrats, who hold run House committees after grabbing a majority in the last election, though the chamber is at least temporarily deadlocked pending the outcome of two special elections this spring.
Koleszar responded after