Pennsylvania Recovery and Resiliency - Behavioral Health for the New Century

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Statewide/Initiatives > School Based Mental Health Services

School Based Behavioral Health (SBBH)
The Children’s Bureau has been working with the Department of Education in working to ensuring that schools are caring and supportive places that maximize learning as well as social, emotional, and behavioral development. SBBH will bring together schools, county mental health programs, and community resources to develop a continuum of services that enable children to have their educational and mental health needs met within their school districts. The Children’s Bureau is moving forward in several areas of the state to support school-based mental health initiatives.

Student Assistance Program (SAP)
The Student Assistance Program (SAP) is a collaborative effort between the Pennsylvania Departments of Education, Health and Welfare that is comprised of school personnel and behavioral health professionals. The primary goal of the program is to address barriers to learning and to enhance student success. SAP is operating in all 501 school districts throughout the Commonwealth.

School-Wide Positive Behavior Support: A Plan for Pennsylvania
The Education Law Center recently released a report on School-Wide Positive Behavior Support, which is a research-based, highly effective, approach to creating, teaching, and reinforcing students’ social, emotional, and academic learning skills that improves and sustains academic achievement and mental and emotional wellbeing of all students. Other states that have implemented PBS have reduced disciplinary referrals, increased students’ academic achievement, and improved school climate and safety. Pennsylvania has already started to implement PBS through a small pilot project. A workgroup of the OMHSAS Children's Advisory Committee is developing a white paper on positive behavior support that will recommend its implementation in all 501 school districts in Pennsylvania.

National Technical Assistance Center on Positive Behavior and Intervention Supports
Funded by the Office of Special Education Programs in the US Department of Education, the National Technical Assistance Center on Positive Behavior and Intervention Supports was established to address the behavioral and discipline systems needed for successful learning and social development of students. The Center provides capacity-building information and technical support about behavioral systems to assist states.