School leaders admit locating mental health services is hard

According to research published by the mental health charity Place2be and the NAHT, 56 per cent of school leaders say that it’s hard to locate mental health services and 22 per cent who tried to find support said they were unsuccessful.

The research is based on responses from 1,114 school leaders across England and Wales and shows that 93 per cent of participants believe that pupils are bringing more worries into school than they did five years ago.

Thirty-one per cent of school leaders said that the most common barrier to finding support was due to lack of local services and 28 per cent put it down to budget constraints.

In addition to this, two thirds of school leaders in the west midlands and south-west admitted that locating support was hard, in comparison to the lower amount of 37 per cent in London.

Almost all of primary school leaders (97 per cent) felt people underestimate the level of mental health problems with pupils and 95 per cent said they feel that their teachers already go “above and beyond” to support the pupils.

Two in five of primary school leaders were confident that their staff could respond during a mental health crisis.

The prime minister has announced that measures are in place to bring in mental health training for teachers, but this will only be applicable to secondary schools.

Catherine Roche, CEO of Place2Be said: “In classrooms up and down the country, we know teachers are working incredibly hard to support the emotional needs of their pupils.

“They know when something is wrong, but it can be difficult to know how best to help, especially when there are no mental health professionals to turn to.

“Place2Be strongly believes in the power of early intervention. Our evidence shows that making support accessible to children from a young age can have a hugely beneficial impact on their wellbeing, and also reduces the burden on teachers so they can focus on learning.

She added: “Both primary and secondary schools need to be able to access this support.”

Russell Hobby, general secretary of school leaders’ union NAHT, also commented: "Just as we are becoming more aware of children's mental health issues the resources are being taken away.

“School budgets are being cut by £3 billion so it will become increasingly difficult to fund in-school care for children unless these cuts are reversed immediately. This problem is exacerbated when the school seeks to access help itself, because of the chaos in the health and social care system.”