Access to mental health services has improved in Ohio's schools over the past decade, but recent budget constraints are causing some public school districts to scale back those services. In recent months, several districts announced significant reductions in staff that will take some teachers out of classrooms and mental health professionals out of school buildings.
Cincinnati Public Schools is considering cutting a third of its social workers, about two dozen positions in total, along with 16 school counselors and nine resource coordinators, as it works to reduce its operating budget for the upcoming academic year. Other districts, such as Fairfield City Schools and New Richmond Schools in Clermont County, are eliminating school psychologist and mental health counselor positions due to financial constraints after their levy proposals failed to get the votes needed to pass in early May.
These reductions are happening while students still face many mental health challenges, especially older students.
Data shared by the Health Policy Institute of Ohio shows that in 2023, 20% of Ohio's middle school students reported their mental health was not good most or all the time. About a third of the state's high school students also reported poor mental health, with even higher rates among girls, LGBTQ+ and low-income students.
Pandemic 'highlighted the need'
In the wake of the COVID-19 lockdowns, schools like CPS invested thousands of additional federal dollars into mental health services for students. Now that most of that additional federal money has run out, it's becoming harder for schools to come up with the funds to keep some of those services going.
Deb Robison, director of outreach for the Ohio School-Based Center of Excellence for Prevention & Intervention at Miami University, says the mental health support schools invested in was badly needed when students were isolated during the pandemic, but it still remains a necessity.
"Some of that isolation may have receded, and some of that anxiety may have receded, but we still have students and young people who have that need. That need has not gone away because the pandemic has gone away. The pandemic just highlighted that need," she told WVXU.
She adds that a reduction in the number of mental health professionals in schools will put a greater strain on the remaining social workers, counselors and teachers who will have to pick up the slack and fill those roles. If CPS goes through with its staff cuts proposed earlier this month, it will leave the district with one social worker per 800 students. Robison says that will make services harder to access and lead to an increase in behavioral and academic issues.
"I think we will see, probably, more situations where students are suspended or expelled from school," Robison said. "I think we'll see more situations where absenteeism is on the rise."
The Board of Education at Cincinnati Public Schools has not yet approved the proposed staff cuts, but Fairfield and New Richmond Schools already have reduced their mental health personnel.
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