MACMH’s Anti-Stigma Grant
Serves 4 Minnesota Schools
The Minnesota Association for Children’s Mental Health (MACMH) recently received a $25,000 Campaign for Mental Health Recovery (CMHR) grant from SAMHSA, the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. SAMHSA’s Resource Center to Address Discrimination and Stigma (ADS Center) has established the campaign to improve the general understanding of mental illness, promote recovery, and encourage people to seek help for mental health problems.
The CMHR grant funding gives MACMH the opportunity to implement the Continuum for Mental Health curriculum in four Minnesota schools in 2008. The participating schools are Mahnomen Elementary School, Naytahwaush Community Charter School (both in northern Minnesota), Groveland Park Elementary School in St. Paul, and Friendship Academy of Fine Arts in Minneapolis. This unique program’s innovative curriculum is designed to reduce the stigma and discrimination that children with mental health disorders encounter by creating an open environment and increased communication among teachers, students, and families. Initial work in the participating schools will focus on providing students, teachers, and parents with accurate, reliable information about mental health, mental fitness, and mental illness.
One of the most powerful concepts the curriculum conveys is the idea that mental health can be viewed as a continuum that includes mental fitness on the one end and severe mental illness on the other. Another unique feature of the continuum curriculum is its comprehensive approach. As school staff are learning about early warning signs, classroom accommodations, effective instructional strategies, and positive behavior supports, the students will be learning stress management techniques and enhancing their communication skills so they will be better able to appropriately and effectively express their emotions. In addition to school-based activities, the curriculum reaches beyond the classroom through its parent/teacher communication strategy trainings and mental health take-home lessons that students are encouraged to complete with their parents. The program also includes "Fidgety Fairy Tales," a musical theatre production that promotes positive images of children with mental health disorders.
MACMH thanks SAMHSA for the opportunity to work with the participating schools to help them create environments that recognize the importance of good mental health habits and are supportive of each child’s individual needs.
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Multi-Year Grant Enhances
Minnesota’s Family Networks
The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) Center for Mental Health Services has awarded a three-year grant to MACMH under its Statewide Family Networks Grant program. The grant, which provides $60,000 per year, funds projects designed to enhance state capacity and infrastructure so they are more oriented to the needs of children and adolescents who have serious emotional disturbances and their families.
The program has established family organizations in nearly every state that promote a child and family focus. On-going work will ensure “self-sufficient, empowered networks that will effectively participate in state and local mental health services planning and health care reform activities related to improving community-based services.”
In Minnesota the grant will fund the Family Catalyst Project (FCP), which will allow MACMH to offer parents from around the state a year-long opportunity to build leadership skills while participating in mentored work experiences on projects that can improve day-to-day practice for Minnesota children who have mental health disorders. These “catalysts” will work with some of the state's most energizing and experienced trainers and change agents on research projects, community committees, and new initiatives.
Each year of the grant, 10 parents or caregivers will be chosen to participate.
In 2008 the participants will be chosen from the seven-county Twin Cities metro region, and in 2009 and 2010 the participants will be chosen from Greater Minnesota. MACMH has partnered with a wide range of parent advocacy groups to build its pool of applicants, and other partnerships are being created to provide curriculum materials, trainers, projects for participation, and mentors.
The interview and selection process to choose the 2008 participants is well underway, and trainings are expected to begin in March.
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