2009_CONFERENCE

2009 Conference
Last Update: 11/01/2009 12:16 PM

Media Advisory

Contact: Charles E. Lewis, Jr.
celewis@howard.edu • 917-570-3116

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

U.S. Loses $247 Billion to Untreated Teen Mental

Health Needs: Are Schools the Answer?

WASHINGTON, D.C.: Nationally recognized experts in the field of school-based mental health services will gather for a timely discussion of its future during the 21^st Annual Conference of the Mental Health Association of the District of Columbia (MHADC) on Wednesday, May 13,2009 from 8:00 a.m. until 4:00 p.m. at Howard University’s Armour J. Blackburn Center, 2397 Sixth Street, N.W., Washington, DC 20059. The conference is being convened in the wake of a recent report released by the National Academy of Sciences documenting that failure to provide for the psychological and emotional needs of young people is costing the nation about $247 billion annually.

“Schools are a natural frontier to explore for providing critical psychological and emotional support to young people,” stated Dr. Charles E. Lewis, Jr., president of the Mental Health Association and assistant professor at Howard University’s School of Social Work. “Yet, there are many issues that must be thoroughly examined because schools are not designed to provide these services.”

Topics to be explored at the conference include (a) financing school-based mental health services, (b) school-based programs to reduce violence, (c) school-based services for Latinos and other immigrants, (d) school-based services for students with special needs, and (e) utilizing families and communities to enhance school-based mental health services.

Among those participating in the conference is Dr. Mark D. Weist, professor at the University of Maryland School of Medicine, and director of the Center for School-based Mental Health (CSMH), one of two federally-funded national centers; Drs. Julia Graham Lear and Olga Acosta Price, co-directors of the Center for Health and Health Care in Schools at the School of Public Health and Health Services at George Washington University, and co-authors of a recent report on school-based mental health services in the District of Columbia; Dr. William B. Lawson, chair of the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at Howard University School of Medicine and president-elect of the Washington Psychiatric Association; and Barbara J. Parks, Clinical Program Administrator for school-based programs for the DC Department of Mental Health.

For more than 50 years, the Mental Health Association of the District of Columbia has been dedicated to promoting mental health within the District of Columbia through advocacy, education, research and the provision of comprehensive and quality services.