What do parents want from schools when it comes to supporting their children’s mental health?
Mainly for peace of mind.
That’s according to the latest data from Action for Healthy Kids, a nonprofit that promotes the mental and physical health of school-age children. The report’s findings come from a survey of nearly 1,000 parents with children attending K-12 schools conducted in December 2023.
Parents’ concerns about their children’s mental health range from worries about stress to fears that their children will experience racism at school. “The pressure to do well on tests can sometimes be overwhelming,” one parent wrote.
The goal of collecting data about parents’ views on mental health is to give parents what they want, says Rob Biscegli, the organization’s executive director and president. According to survey responses, that means training and tools on how to talk to their kids about issues that affect their health. Action for Healthy Kids is using the survey data to create guides for parents on topics such as general mental health, racism, body positivity, body shaming and suicide prevention.
“Our program is what we call a home-school partnership model, so what families – parents and guardians – think is particularly important and interesting to us,” Bisceglie says.
Strong support for services
Parents surveyed generally agreed that having a school where their child feels a sense of belonging is important to support students’ mental health. Parents also wanted schools to provide mental health services.
Nearly 70 percent of parents say their child has “at least one trusted adult at school who they can talk to,” and 88 percent say a welcoming classroom environment would especially help their child feel safe and supported. Nearly the same percentage of parents want teachers to do their best to foster positive relationships among students.
Despite the recent politicization of K-12 schools, a majority of parents said they want schools to include lessons on topics such as “respect, cooperation, patience and empathy.”
“I don’t think this is surprising, [the report] “This experience really reinforced to me that what parents really want for their children in school is for them to feel safe and loved and belong,” Bisceglie says. “We want that nurturing relationship to be built with the parent or primary caregiver. The school is the next most likely to be able to provide that nurturing support for children, which is why it’s so important.”
Feeling “good”
The most common barrier parents cited to seeking mental health services was their child feeling like there’s nothing wrong with them when the parent doesn’t – 38 percent of parents said this was a problem.
Anaïs Murphy, senior manager of adolescent mental health and social-emotional learning programs at Action for Healthy Kids, says that while parents may worry that their child is telling them they’re OK when they actually aren’t, it’s also important for parents to know what behaviors are normal for each age group.
“I think one of the goals of this campaign is to give parents the information they need to understand what ‘it’s OK’ means,” Murphy explains. “We’re not trying to overdiagnose or inappropriately alarmize, but we want parents to understand what the typical indicators of development and mental health are. 14-year-olds are really irritable, and that’s totally normal and sometimes it’s a cause for concern, but sometimes it’s exactly how they should be.”
The figures also show parents are paying more attention to their young people’s mental health than ever before, Murphy said, and the organization wants to help parents know where to go to get more help.
“We’re at a point where there’s less stigma around mental health, at least among younger generations,” she says. “I think that’s a big part of it, even though it’s not necessarily something that was revealed in this study. [confirmed] And in other studies too.”
Racism in schools
In addition to mental health concerns, 58 parents with black parents and 45 parents with Hispanic parents are worried their children will experience racism at school.
Bisceglie said this year was the first time the survey asked parents about concerns about racism.
Murphy said one of the tools the organization is working on as a result of its research is a guide for how parents can talk to their children about racism at home, and how teachers can do the same at school.
“I think one of the things that’s happened around the time of the pandemic and the George Floyd incident is that we’ve started talking a lot more about racism and systems like schools,” she says. “It’s not that people weren’t experiencing it before, but we just hadn’t necessarily paid attention to it. So, I wasn’t all that surprised, because schools are subject to the same kinds of institutional forces as every other institution, and structural racism and systemic racism is one of them. I think it’s really important that the level of collective consciousness has been raised so that we can talk about it.”
