Greater Lakes in-school therapy empowers students to take charge of mental health
Behavioral health therapist Lauren Mitchell begins many of her sessions helping her adolescent patients understand what they’re feeling.
Mitchell spends two days a week with Pierce County elementary school students and families as part of a school counseling program through Greater Lakes Mental Healthcare, part of the MultiCare Behavioral Health Network.
In-school counseling is a way to provide mental health services to some of the community’s hardest-to-reach populations. Greater Lakes, along with the Behavioral Health Network, serve more than 50 elementary, middle and high schools across nine Pierce County school districts.
Services focus on students, but family and group sessions are available as needed, as well as medication management.
Clinicians like Mitchell use creative approaches to meet students where they are, such as playing games with those struggling to stay on task or listen actively. For students dealing with anxiety, she uses charades or other nontraditional ways to talk about coping skills.
One of the highlights of the program is its comprehensive approach to care. Clinicians guide families in offering positive reinforcement at home and school staff provide feedback on what they see in the classroom, too.
“The ‘on-site-ness’ of it gives them the ability to see a child in a much more holistic view,” says Abby Sloan, principal of Jennie Reed Elementary School, where a therapist is on campus two-and-a-half days a week. “When you work on a parent-suggested area of need, that’s the only view you have, whereas our therapists also understand the specific things going on at our school and how that impacts the student in different ways.”
In the 2022-2023 school year, Greater Lakes served approximately 600 students through its in-school counseling program.