Daviess County Public Schools on Thursday hosted the third annual Umbrella Project, a summit to allow educators throughout the community to learn how to focus on mental health within the school systems. Lt. Gov. Jacqueline Coleman was the featured speaker at the event.
Coleman, who has more than a decade of experience as an educator/administrator and who worked for the past several years with the KY Student Mental Health Initiative, said discussions about mental health issues didn’t start because of the pandemic.
“I want to make sure we acknowledge that the pandemic did not create mental health challenges. It truly just exacerbated it,” Coleman said.
Coleman said when she first entered the education sector, she was doing a disservice to her students because she didn’t know much about mental health and social-emotional learning.
Now on the other side of education and hearing stories from across the Commonwealth, she said the importance of leading with effective mental health benefits the students.
“We’ve got to make sure that we’re standing by them and giving them the support that they need, because the future of Kentucky’s economy is in our classrooms today,” she said.
Coleman noted that through discussions with the Student Advisory Council, they obtained $40 million for Kentucky for school-based student mental health services.
“This funding is going to go to all corners of the Commonwealth. It is not going everywhere, and I’m not going to rest until we make sure that every kid in every zip code has access to this kind of opportunity,” Coleman said.
Approximately 530 people attended the various sessions held throughout the day. This year’s summit welcomed attendees from at least 15 school districts, with representation from school administrators, teachers, counselors, family resource coordinators and advocates, social workers, mental health professionals and other school support staff.
Sessions covered topics such as academic interventions, equity, and family support. Educators also got the hear from nationally recognized speakers and learn new ways to effectively serve the needs of their students, families, and staff.
“A lot of times, schools will send someone to a conference to hear a speaker like that, and it impacts two or three people,” said Dr. Amy Shutt, DCPS assistant superintendent for human services. “By bringing them here, 500 people are able to hear the speakers, and those people go back into schools and impact kids, so we impact more people by bringing them here and getting them to spend the day with us.”
