A further £7 million to support training for school mental health leads has today been announced by the Department for Education.
The funding brings the total amount being spent on the training programme during the 2022-2023 financial year to £10 million.
This will enable “up to 8,000” more schools and colleges to apply for training grants in this financial year, the DfE said.
The scheme was first launched in September of last year, with up to 7,800 schools able to sign up for a £1,200 grant aimed at training senior leaders in the knowledge and skills they need “to roll out an effective ‘whole school or college approach’ to mental health and wellbeing, embedding it into their culture and making it a priority alongside academic recovery”.
The trained senior mental health lead would then be tasked with identifying those who need support and improving access to specialist services.
The DfE has said the grant is provided to cover, or contribute to, the cost of attending a quality assured course and may also be used to hire supply staff while leads are engaged in learning.
Eligible schools are state-funded primary and secondary schools, including some special and alternative provision.
Last financial year, £9.5 million of funding was made available for the scheme.
A report released today - but unavailable at the time of writing - will assess the rollout of Mental Health Support Teams so far.
It will also explore the progress made so far on wellbeing programmes aimed at helping pupils recover from the emotional impact of the pandemic.
Delays to the rollout
The mental health leads training scheme was first announced in the government’s green paper in 2017, however opportunities for schools to apply for funding to train a mental health lead were not made available until last year.
The Green Paper pledged to offer training to 20 per cent of schools from September 2019, and extend this to all eligible settings in England by 2025.
The DfE has today said that more than 8,000 schools and colleges claimed a £1,200 grant to train a senior mental health lead between October 2021 and March 2022 and that this was “well above ambitions to reach one-third of settings”.
Children and families minister Will Quince said it was ”vital” to continue supporting the wellbeing and mental health of pupils “alongside their academic recovery” and senior mental health leads will play an important role in doing this.
Minister for mental health Gillian Keegan said the past two years had been “particularly challenging” and, although pupils were “incredibly resilient”, it was “crucial” they could access mental health support “as early as possible”.
Ms Keegan added that the government was making “great progress on better supporting young people’s mental health and this additional funding to train senior mental health leads will complement our work on the accelerated rollout of Mental Health Support Teams in schools and expansion of community services, which is well underway”.
Funding for five leading charities and organisations working to tackle bullying and champion respect was also announced by the government today “to continue supporting pupils in thousands of schools in England”.
The DfE has said that this year’s grant ”will focus on projects aimed at tackling bullying against children who identify as LGBT, those with special educational needs and disabilities and victims of hate-related bullying”.
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