An approval during a recent Board of Regents meeting will establish the Iowa Center for School Mental Health as an official University of Iowa College of Education center.
Initially founded in June 2021, the center was a partnership between the Iowa Department of Education and the University of Iowa. After a year of providing services, it became clear that it should become a long term institution within the university, requiring the board to approve it.
The following is an excerpt from the Daily Iowan article:
The Iowa Center for School Mental Health has a goal to establish mental health resources to K-12 schools and give educators training on how to help themselves and students struggling with mental health.
The proposal stated that its goals are to:
- Provide training to educators and anyone else seeking training on mental health education
- Research both the development and implementation of mental health practices, assessments, and interventions taking place in Iowa schools to better understand the best ways to go about implementing mental health services in Iowa classrooms
- Give mental health resources and immediate support to Iowa schools and educators
- Provide professional resources such as mental health outreach, intervention, and post-intervention services to higher education institutions such as the University of Iowa
The center has collaborated with other institutes at the UI such as the Carver College of Medicine, College of Nursing, and UI Hospitals and Clinics.
“This center is a perfect example of how our institution can work with our state government to meet the needs of people in our state,” Daniel Clay, the Dean of the University of Iowa’s College of Education, said at the meeting.
The center has been funded by a 20 million dollar grant from the Department of Education and by philanthropic donations. The request states that the primary focus of funding will be to receive research grants. While the center will be working from within the University of Iowa, it will consult with other institutions, such as the other regency-run Iowa schools Northern Iowa University and Iowa State University, and even those outside of Iowa.