MD Discretionary Funding Fiscal Year 2023

In response to the need to more fully address our students' mental health challenges , the Goucher College Counseling Center is proposing the Gopher Mental Health Initiative. This initiative involves a collaboration between numerous Student Affairs and Faculty Offices: Dean of Students, Student Support and Outreach, Health & Wellness, Residential Life, Athletics, Student Engagement, the Center for Race, Equity, and Identity, and Title IX. The Gopher Mental Health Initiative involves local community resources and business to reduce barriers to mental health care. The project is comprehensive and designed to 1) Increase student access to mental health services to reduce psychological distress, substance use, and impairment in daily functioning as a student (Employ a designated group mental health professional, expanded marketing efforts); 2) Engage with student population to increase mental health awareness and build community through psychoeducational programming (The Happiness Hunt, Fresh Check Day, Residential Curriculum, Mental Health First Aid for Student Leaders); 3) Increase Faculty and Staff awareness of Student Counseling Center services, suicide behaviors, student mental health concerns, and ways to initiate appropriate campus protocols to assist students of concern (Mental Health First Aide, QPR, and “Blue Folders”); 4) Provide specialized, competent, and ethical care to historically marginalized, vulnerable, and attrition-risk populations (Professional Development for staff, expanded outreach to Hispanic students and first-generation students (LAUNCH Program). This combination of public health approach and individual intervention design will mitigate serious mental health concerns and substance abuse disorders.

The Maryland Department of Health's Behavioral Administration (BHA), in partnership with jurisdictions and Maryland Lifeline crisis centers, will build local 988 capacity with the two-year, $1,972,989 988 State and Territory Cooperative Agreement funds (SAMHSA 22-015). This project will increase staff capacity at eight Lifeline centers, allowing them to respond, intervene, and provide follow-up to individuals experiencing a behavioral health crisis. Maryland's life line call volume is projected to increase to 101,700 handled contacts in the first year of 988 implementation. Grant funds will be used by Maryland Lifeline crisis centers to maintain and expand their workforce to respond to this expected increase in Lifeline call, chat, and text volume. During the project, BHA will be working with Lifeline crisis centers and other stakeholders to: Monitor and improve: crisis call, chat, and text answer rates; Increase follow-up services; Ensure appropriate linkages for veterans; Train the workforce on engaging with populations at higher risk of suicide in our communities; Monitoring and improving the handling of contacts that require emergency rescue, involve suicide attempts in progress, and mobile crisis outreach referrals. Ensuring strong linkages between 988 services and the state's suicide prevention plan; and Improving coordination between 988 and 911 services. The state will measure its project success using the following key performance targets: 90% or more of calls, chats, and texts originating in Maryland will be answered by Maryland Lifeline crisis centers. 95% of Maryland 988 calls will be answered within 20 seconds, with 90% of these calls answered within 15 seconds. Less than 5% of calls received are disconnected prior to answer by a Maryland Lifeline crisis center.

To meet the demands of mental health crises in secondary schools, Prince George's County Public Schools (PGCPS) proposes to implement the Connect, Understand, Build, and Empower (CUBE) Project. PGCPS' CUBE project will expand the number of secondary schools trained on Sources of Strength, an evidenced-based suicide prevention program. Sources of Strength is designed to harness peer social networks' power to change unhealthy norms and culture, ultimately preventing suicide, bullying, and substance abuse. The project's goals are to (1) increase staff and students' awareness of mental health resources through training and access to mental health resources and (2) increase the referrals of middle and high school students to school and community-based mental health professionals. PGCPS, is the nation's 20th largest school district and the 2nd largest school system in the state of Maryland, serves 131,657 students in 208 schools and centers. The school district has a diverse student population from urban, suburban, and rural communities near Washington, DC. More than 90% of the students are African American (55.3%) and Hispanic/Latino (36.5%). Additionally, 66.5% of the total student population receives Free and Reduced Meals (FARM)--an indicator of poverty. In a policy review conducted by the Mental Health Foundation, the review demonstrates that poverty increases the risk of mental health problems. Further, a national research study on suicide among youth show that suicide is the 2nd leading cause of death among youth ages 10-14 and 15-24. According to the Centers for Disease and Prevention's (CDC) Youth Risk Behavior Survey (YRBS) 2018 results from Prince George's County, 29.2% of middle school youth sampled reported that they have seriously thought about killing themselves at least once in their lifetime. Similarly, disturbing results found that just twelve months before the survey 19% of high school youth sampled reported that they seriously considered attempting suicide. As a strategic intervention, PGCPS' CUBE project includes expanding Sources of Strength from 10 to 20 middle and high schools. The intervention will (1) be implemented in twenty (20) PGCPS middle and high schools and 1,220 individuals will be trained (2) increase the number of referrals to the contracted mental health clinicians assigned to the middle and high schools where Sources of Strength is implemented (3) increase the number of student self-referrals for suicide intervention conducted by school mental health professionals (e.g., school counselors, school psychologists and mental health clinicians) at the middle and high schools where Sources of Strength is implemented (4) increase the number of peer referrals for suicide intervention conducted by school mental health professionals at the middle and high schools where Sources of Strength is implemented and (5) increase the overall number of suicide interventions conducted by school mental health professionals at the middle and high schools where Sources of Strength is implemented.

The Healthy Tigers project benefits the 22,000+ racially diverse students at Towson University (TU) by training administrators and students on mental health and illness. The project aims to (1), educate the campus community on mental health awareness and response through mental health first aid, crisis de-escalation, and suicide prevention trainings, and (2), remove mental health stigmas and treatment barriers by providing trauma-sensitive programs for students. The Mental Health First Aid Training (MHFA) will provide faculty, staff and students the resources to recognize the signs and symptoms of mental disorders in order to provide initial care to students in distress. The TU Counseling Center will lead suicide prevention training called Question, Persuade, Refer (QPR) to peer educators, Housing and Residence Life (HRL) staff and Towson University Police Department (TUPD) officers, annually. Trauma Center Trauma-Sensitive Yoga (TCTSY) is an adjunctive clinical treatment for managing the symptoms of anxiety, acute stress, PTSD, and will be used in training Campus Recreation and Counseling Center staff. In addition to TCTSY, Trauma-Informed Weight Lifting (TI-WL) intends to transform weight lifting in an effort to both promote and facilitate healing for trauma-impacted individuals, and will be a supplementary training methodology for Campus Recreation staff. In addition to removing stigmas and treatment barriers, the yoga and weight lifting programs serve as a treatment in general, which help to decrease depression, anxiety, and sleep disturbances. These trainings, coupled with digital education campaigns, will increase the awareness of the resources and services available to address mental health symptoms both on and off campus, provide an expansive approach to educating the campus community, and lead to programming that will improves students’ emotional and physical wellbeing. The project intends to train 108 people per year in MHFA (324 by end of project), and five MHFA instructors by the third year. All HRL resident assistants (n=152) and health peer educators (n=50) will be trained annually in QPR, and 11 TUPD officers will be trained over the three-year period of the project. There will be eight professionals trained in trauma-sensitive yoga by year two and four trained in trauma-informed weightlifting by year three of the project. Following the completion of the TCTSY and TI-WL training, two programs per semester will occur, reaching 100 students in its initial year. While the project co-directors will be leading the initiatives, this project will be a campus-wide initiative as part of the university’s goal of enhancing student well-being through education, programs, and services. A beneficial ally and support to this project will be the 34 members of TU’s JED Campus Team. The campus team is a nationwide initiative of The Jed Foundation (JED) designed to guide schools through a collaborative process of comprehensive systems, program, and policy development with customized support to build upon existing student mental health, substance abuse, and suicide prevention efforts.

The University of Maryland Extension’s Maryland Chain of Care (MCC) project will provide Mental Health Awareness Training (MHAT) using the MHFA program to individuals affiliated with (1) peer recovery community organizations and (2) human service referral agencies and libraries. The purpose of the project is to train individuals to prepare them how to recognize and appropriately and safely respond to individuals with mental disorders, particularly individuals with serious mental illness (SMI) and serious emotional disturbances (SED). The measurable outcome of the project has been identified as training 250 individuals in peer recovery, human service agencies, and librarians per year to reach our 5-year goal of 1250 individuals. We target peer recovery community organizations across Maryland and human service organizations and libraries, serving Western and Central Maryland (Baltimore City, Garret, Allegany, Washington, Baltimore, Howard, Prince George’s Counties). In Collaboration with Voices of Hope, Office of Consumer Advocates, Consumer United Way of Central Maryland, and public libraries, the program goals and activities for the next five years will include: Goal 1 Increase the capacity of individuals in peer recovery community organizations, human service organizations, and libraries to recognize the signs and symptoms of mental disorders, and to safely respond to by training them with the evidenced-based program MHFA. Objective 1.1. By September 29, 2022, 16 individuals in mental health and human service professions will have completed MHFA instructors training. (16 each in Y2-5, a total of 80 instructors) Objective 1.2. By September 29, 2022, 150 individuals from peer recovery community organizations, 40 human service organizations, and 60 librarians will have completed the MHFA program. (250 each in Y2-5, total of 1,250 individuals) Goal 2 Increase the number of referrals for individuals with the signs or symptoms of mental illness to appropriate services Objective 2.1. By September 29, 2022, the referral mechanism, including the list of mental health services and resources using pre-existing relationships, referral assessment, tracking databases will used to make referrals for 500 individuals. (500 each in Y 2-5, total: 2,500) Objective 2.2. By September 29, 2022, resources and supports of mental health services for the population of focus will be distributed to 1000 individuals. (1,000 each in Y 2-5, total: 5,000) The project will increase the number of trained individuals with MHFA, strengthen the collaboration and coordination among professionals, and increase the information dissemination and referrals to mental health services.