Mandate pushes mental health and addiction minister to expand support in schools

Alberta's premier wants her mental health and addiction minister to expand help for children and youth in Alberta schools and communities.

Premier Danielle Smith's mandate letter to Minister Daniel Williams instructs him to bring United Conservative Party election promises to life, including the creation of four new inpatient mental wellness centres for youth.

"We recognize that prevention and caring for youth is the best way for us to deal with this as a system, as a province, and as society," Williams said in a Wednesday interview.

During the May provincial election, the UCP campaigned on building four 30-bed "youth centres of excellence" in Edmonton, Calgary, Red Deer and Lethbridge to specialize in addiction recovery and healing from trauma.

Smith also instructed Williams to increase the number of "mental health classrooms" in the province's schools to 60 from the current 20. The specialized in-school programs help youth continue their education while grappling with severe mental health challenges. In addition to a teacher, students have access to a psychiatrist, mental health therapist, nurse, speech language pathologist and other health-care workers.

Smith also wants Williams to expand a program for students with less intensive needs that offers meal programs, social and health-care workers and police officers stationed in "high needs" schools.

Williams will also fund First Nations and Métis schools to design mental health programs appropriate for their communities, the letter says.

School board leaders have long been advocating for the provincial government to better equip them to cope with increasing numbers of students with mental health problems.

"It's a crisis," said Dennis MacNeil, president of the Public School Boards Association of Alberta, in a Wednesday interview. "We are in crisis mode. It's another epidemic."

MacNeil, who is also a school trustee with Athabasca-based Aspen View Public Schools, said three youth in his community have recently taken their own lives.

School staff, students and their families are all dealing with the lingering effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, he said.

The education ministry has already funded some mental health pilot projects across the province. MacNeil said the successful ones should be scaled up and replicated widely.

MacNeil is happy to see the government plan further investments in school-based mental health programs. However, he isn't sure what a "mental health classroom" is, and questions how much of a difference 60 programs will make in a province with thousands of schools and 766,000 students.

He sees training and recruiting personnel — particularly in rural areas — as the biggest area of need.