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A guide to mental health resources for students

Capital - 8/30/2020

As the coronavirus pandemic continues to carry on nationally, its impact has reached the 2020-21 academic school year in Anne Arundel County. School officials announced the cancellation of in-person learning on July 20, moving all schooling to online only for the first semester.

The absence of physical school and all of the normal classes, clubs and other social activities students are used to, coupled with the loss of the last few months of the previous school year, poses a heavy emotional and mental threat to students' mental health.

For all of these things, Ryan Voegtlin encourages students not to hesitate to reach out to talk about it.

As director of student services for AACPS, Voegtlin oversees school counseling, psychological resources, school social work and pupil personnel, and said all related staff have been working diligently to support students who come with concerns over their mental health. This includes tele-mental health sessions, teaching social and emotional learning and skills in digital classrooms and sending the following resources to parents.

Everyone, Voegtlin said, is in the same storm, but on different boats. All handling it differently. He suggested students find things to calm their minds, whether that be exercise or reading or going outside. Student services at Severna Park created a "virtual calming room," a page filled with rain sounds, guided meditations - even a live penguin cam.

"In order to soothe mental anxiety, it is important to make time to do things that make you feel happy and calm," Voegtlin wrote in an email. "This can be difficult in today's world, but creating self-care routines is an important life lesson that will help our students now, and as they become adults."

Back in April, the Kaiser Family Foundation released a study on the increase on anxiety and depression among the general population, but singled out adolescents as a worry demographic. Between 2016-2018, the KFF found one in 10 teenagers between ages 12 and 17 had anxiety or depression.

Wrote the authors of the KFF report, "Existing mental illness among adolescents may be exacerbated by the pandemic, and with school closures, they will not have the same access to key mental health services."

Suicide is the second leading cause of deaths among teenagers in that age group. And now, students have been cut off from seeing sources of mental reprieve in school in person, such as guidance counselors.

Should the mental health needs of a student surpass what Voegtlin and his teams can provide, they can refer the student through the "expanded school-based mental health" program, where, during the pandemic, students can attain more mental health work.

Voegtlin suggested his own list of resources students can turn to, such as:

* Call 911 for immediate assistance in an emergency

* Anne Arundel County Crisis Response Warm Line - 410-768-5522

* Crisis Text Line - Text HOME to 741741

* Maryland Youth Crisis Hotline - 1-800-422-0009

* National Suicide Prevention Hotline - 1-800-273-8255

* Anne Arundel County Public Schools Student Safety Hotline - 1-877-676-9854

* AACPS Crisis Resources Webpage

* Anne Arundel Mental Health Agency - 410-222-7858

* Systems of Care - Anne Arundel County - 1-800-485-0041

* 2-1-1 Maryland - Dial 211, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week

* Food Access Warmline - 410-222-FOOD (3663)

* National Association for School Psychologists (NASP) - Helping Children Cope with Changes Resulting from COVID-19

* American Foundation for Suicide Prevention

* The Yellow Tulip Project

"The advice that I would give to a student who is fretting about the state of their immediate future is to try to realize that these feelings are very difficult, but completely normal. During this time, it is important to identify what you're feeling and to focus on what is within your control," Voegtlin wrote.

Anne Arundel County Public Schools has also put together a list resources for students who need to seek help during this time. That listing can be accessed at www.aacps.org/crisisresources.

Caption: Student services at Severna Park created a "virtual calming room," a page filled with rain sounds, guided meditations - even a live penguin cam. While schooling in Anne Arundel County has been online for months and will be online for at least the first semester of the 2020-2021 school year, the absence of physical school and normal school activities could be detrimental to students' mental health.

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