This two-year project aims to develop a package of training materials and resources at a European level to upskill teachers in supporting students with mental health issues and building resilience in both themselves and their students. It addresses the well-being of both students and staff. The target age group is the Secondary sector, and the project brings together 6 partners from 5 countries. Partners will identify the issues relating to the well-being of both students and staff and develop a common methodology to address those issues. The project has two strands. Firstly, it will address the vulnerabilities faced by students and develop strategies to address them, and secondly it will identify the pressures facing school staff and develop training resources to help mitigate them. There are therefore two sets of target groups, both staff and students. There is ample research to show that there has been an increase in stresses and pressures on both staff and students in recent years leading to a range of undesirable outcomes, such as increased absenteeism through mental illness, reduced performance, and teacher drop-out. EU level policy recommendations include, promoting schools as a setting for health promotion and prevention of mental and behavioural disorders, early identification for all children and young people and enhanced training for all school staff on mental health. Research also points to the need to build resilience in teachers and school leaders to develop strong self-regulatory skills. The overall objectives are to: • analyse and share existing strategies and resources for identifying and addressing vulnerabilities in both staff and students • identify common areas of strength and priorities for development • undertake a study visit to Batley Girls High School in the UK to investigate the policies and practice of assessing vulnerabilities and resilience and preparing teachers to address them • use the outcomes to develop a generic tool for identifying those at risk • develop a model set of training resources and a methodology to equip teachers to identify and target vulnerable students and address their own life balance issues • test the methodology and associated resources in schools in 5 countries • produce an impact report incorporating a series of case studies and recommendations for school policy • disseminate the outcomes widely There will be 2 Intellectual Outputs and 1 training event. The training event will explore an example of best practice in the UK and then produce a framework for a set of 5 training modules which are developed in Intellectual Output 1. The training modules will be: Module 1: Understanding well-being Module 2: Supporting the well-being of young people Module 3: Professional Development for teachers and support staff Module 4: Support for the well-being of school staff Module 5: School policy Once these modules are produced they will be trialed in schools in 5 counties with around 50 teachers, 30 trainee teachers and 460 students. There is a need to undertake this work transnationally as the target groups in the different countries have different contexts, but the issue is an EU wide problem requiring transnational solutions. This can be achieved by sharing of best practice and expertise and by specifically creating a set of resources and methodology that is applicable and relevant for all European schools by testing them in the different contexts.
The focus of this Strategic Partnership was to support the exchange of good practices with the aim of developing a package of training materials and resources at a European level to upskill teachers in supporting students with mental health issues and building resilience in both themselves and their students by: • sharing and confronting ideas, practices and methods on the vulnerabilities faced by students and strategies to address them • identifying the pressures facing school staff and strategies to help mitigate them The objectives were to • analyse and share existing strategies and resources for identifying and addressing vulnerabilities in both staff and students • identify common areas of strength and priorities for development • undertake a study visit to Batley Girls school to investigate the policies and practice of assessing vulnerabilities and resilience and preparing teachers to address them • use the outcomes to develop a generic tool for identifying those at risk • develop a model set of training resources and a methodology to equip teachers to identify and target vulnerable students and address their own life balance issues • test the methodology and associated resources in schools in 5 countries • evaluate impact identifying sample case studies and recommendations for school policy • disseminate the outcomes widely
The issue of the well being of staff and pupils has been identified as a real problem in the school context. The project needs were identified through various peicies of research including the EU report on Mental Health and Schools, the UK Education Support Partnership on the mental health and well-being of educational professionals and the UK Ofsted report - Teacher well-being at work in schools and further education providers. These all highlighted the pressures face by staff and pupils. For pupils these included increases in stress/anxiety/panic attacks resulting in depression, self-harm, anxiety and fear of the future and for staff workload pressures which had led to 53% considering leaving the profession and 28% taking time off work as a result. The data showed that a significant majority felt that they had not received sufficient guidance about their health and well-being in work. Batley Girls school had initiated various strategies to deal with this and this project used their best practice as a baseline to build a set of training materials and resources at a European level to upskill teachers in supporting students with mental health issues and building resilience in both themselves and their students. It addressed the well-being of both students and staff. The target age group was the Secondary sector, and the project brought together 6 partners from 5 countries. Partners identified the issues relating to the well-being of both students and staff and developed a common methodology to address those issues. The project had two strands. Firstly, it addressed the vulnerabilities faced by students and developed strategies to address them, and secondly it identified the pressures facing school staff and developed training resources to help mitigate them. There were therefore two sets of target groups, both staff and students. The project took on greater relevance as it got underway with the outbreak of Covid, which created even more pressures on staff and pupils as they had a adapt to new ways of teaching and learning, increases in staff and pupil absence and in the extreme cases coping with bereavement.