Training school staff to deliver psychological interventions
Research type
Research Study
Full title
Evaluating whether a school-based psychological treatment package developed for front-line school workers is utilised.
IRAS ID
184841
Contact name
Mina Fazel
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
University of Oxford
Duration of Study in the UK
1 years, 1 months, 12 days
Research summary
This brief and simple project is to evaluate the extent to which commonly used psychological interventions for mental health problems are actually utilised following training. The project will be looking in the context of school based mental health work and training those staff that work in schools. There is increasing emphasis placed on the importance of intervening early for young people who show signs of emotional or behavioural problems, before they would fulfil referral criteria for formal mental health services. Many of the early signs, such as disruptive behaviour, poor sleep and difficulty drawing on existing support structures can be helped with a range of straight-forward interventions. This study will evaluate how much a two hour training in some commonly used psychological interventions actually changes what front line school workers (teachers, teaching assistants, counsellors and other members of pastoral support staff) do when they are working with young people. These interventions are currently taught in a range of settings but it is unclear, following the training, how much practice actually changes.
We will recruit teachers, teaching assistants, other members of the pastoral support staff and third sector workers supporting children within secondary schools prior to the training in specific psychological support provision. Many of the early signs of mental health problems are picked up first by school staff and as this is a key period for psychological support, it is important to ensure that the psychological support offered to these workers is used. A toolbox has been developed which takes commonly used interventions and in this project we will train front-line workers in this ‘school mental health toolbox’ (SMHT) of psychological interventions. Young people in school often receive a range of ‘supports’ and so this toolbox will not be asking staff to increase the time they spend with their students, but will be offering alternative strategies for them to employ when they are spending time with the young people of concern. We will give a questionnaire to those receiving the training before they receive the training and then a follow-up questionnaire three months after the training to assess firstly whether they already use any of the interventions being taught and then to determine if their practice has changed and which of the tools taught are most utilised.REC name
Social Care REC
REC reference
15/IEC08/0055
Date of REC Opinion
8 Oct 2015
REC opinion
Favourable Opinion