December 2, 2024

InfoTrace

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Student mental health non-profit expands to southern Alberta

Student mental health non-profit expands to southern Alberta

Charitable non-profit that offers mental health services to students with complex psychological and psychiatric needs poised to build facility in Calgary.

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Alberta is investing $148 million in a charitable non-profit that offers mental-health services to students with complex psychological and psychiatric needs.

The investment will expand the operations of the Child and Adolescent Services Association (CASA) to southern Alberta, where in addition to specialty services such as in-school and family support, the organization will host students dealing with severe psychological issues in live-in treatment facilities.

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CASA’s services, mainly offered in northern and central Alberta, fall into three categories: CASA classrooms, CASA houses and specialty services.

In schools, students can seek individual therapy, group therapy and psychiatric care to support their recovery while continuing their education. There are eight of these classrooms in several communities, including Edmonton, Red Deer and Medicine Hat.

Bonnie Blakley, CEO of CASA, said each classroom, which runs twice a year, hosts 12 students selected through referrals from health-care professionals between grades 4 and 12. Two of these classrooms will be made available in Calgary in September.

“A child that would normally get that type of classroom service is a child who already has had some interaction with the health system, maybe had a little bit of therapy, or maybe has been with their family physician who sees that they need a higher level of care,” said Blakley.

Sometimes, she added, students are referred to services in the community. When students require a higher level of care, they are connected with medical support or are enrolled in what the organization calls CASA Houses.

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These are semi-locked facilities where children with severe mental illness are voluntarily enrolled by their parents following a referral from Alberta Health Services.

Bonnie Blakely CASA
Bonnie Blakley, chief executive officer with CASA Mental Health, speaks at Bishop Carroll High School on Friday May 10, 2024. Gavin Young/Postmedia

“They might have a mental-health issue and an addiction, or mental-health issue and an eating disorder. And they require long-term programming where they stay overnight,” Blakley said.

She added the students, who live in these facilities for a semester term, are sent to school during the day and brought back to the institution. “We follow those kids for almost two months once they leave us back into their communities.”

The location of these institutions hasn’t been finalized, but Blakley said the organization is poised to build one in Calgary.

CASA also provides several other community-based programs for students suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder, fetal alcohol spectrum disorder and various attachment issues.

Of the $148 million to be spent by the Alberta government, $40 million will go toward tripling the number of CASA classrooms, $98 million will be used to build and operate three CASA houses and expand services at the existing CASA house, and $10 million will expand the organization’s specialty services.

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The Alberta Teachers’ Association welcomed the initiative. “The expansion of CASA classrooms is one step in addressing the mental health crisis in Alberta schools,” said Jason Schilling, ATA president. “These additional classrooms will meet the needs of students requiring the specialized mental health support that CASA classrooms provide.”

Blakley said the number of people enrolling in these programs has been rising steadily since the pandemic, and so has the severity of their issues. “It’s hard to know whether the pandemic creates some of it or just creates opportunity where people are talking more about it,” she added.

A 2023 report by the University of Calgary found mental illness now affects one in every four Canadian youth, and demands for supports have steadily increased in the past decade.

One of the report’s multiple authors, Jennifer Zwicker, director of health policy at the School of Public Policy, has said too many kids are falling through the cracks because Alberta lacks a unified strategy, offering instead a haphazard, patchwork approach to tracking patient outcomes, identifying trends and referring patients to services.

The Alberta government has set aside $30 million in its 2024 budget for student mental health and well-being, but advocates say the funding hasn’t kept pace with student growth.

— With files from Eva Ferguson

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