Medicine Hat High School student delegates Andrea Perez, Sonak Saha, Alexis Unreiner and Madison Zilkie present survey findings around mental health supports to public school board members Tuesday.--NEWS PHOTO BRENDAN MILLER
bmiller@medicinehatnews.com
Eight student delegates from Medicine Hat High School’s Student Senate collected data from more than 200 of their peers on mental health resources and awareness and presented their findings to public board members Tuesday.
The survey asked students about their awareness of mental health supports at schools and how many resources are provided in the public division. A total of 233 students from Grades 10-12 participated in the survey, roughly 20 per cent of the school’s student body.
Overall the data emphasized the importance of promoting existing services and making mental health support resources easy to access.
“Our group saw an opportunity to take something that they understood and that mattered to them.” said teacher Ricky Hildebrand. “And they could gather (data) from other students.
“Mental health issues are something that resonates with students right now, but also that they can give feedback on in a way the school board would find meaningful.”
Hildebrand explained that the survey provides board trustees an authentic student perspective useful for future decisions.
“I think it’s really valuable to allow students to have a chance to say, ‘Here’s what matters to us, it’s our issues, we’ve collected it, we’ve done the work and now we can present it.”
Board members say the student-led survey and presentation provided them useful information about ways the division can improve supporting students.
“They gave advice in terms of things that we can do,” said superintendent Mark Davidson. “We’ll share that with site-based administrators and then we will build a plan for how to ask questions they thought we should ask and share the information they thought we should share.”
The presentation sparked a conversation between board members on the importance for a comprehensive approach of mental health support in high schools.
