Unlocking Aspen: Revolutionizing Student Mental Health Care with Jacqueline Brown and Billie Hartgrove

Struggling to find suitable mental health resources for your child? This episode is your key to unlocking accessible help. Join me, Steve Horn, as I navigate the intricacies of Aspen, a platform revolutionizing mental health care in our county, with Jacqueline Brown from Aspen Network Incorporated, and Billie Hartgrove, the Mental Health Coordinator for the DeSoto School District. Jacqueline enlightens us about Aspen's unique preventive approach, empowering students to self-screen and connect to appropriate resources before reaching a crisis point, making mental health care more proactive than reactive.

Billie elaborates on the benefits of the Aspen platform, especially during times when students are most vulnerable, such as holidays and weekends. We discuss how Aspen has transformed the accessibility of resources in our district, with its unmatched ability to connect students' specific needs to appropriate services, thereby significantly improving success rates. If early signs of troubles surface, don't wait for a crisis to erupt. Reach out to your school's mental health professional and learn how to connect your child with Aspen. We're here to help, tune in to learn more about this game-changing platform and its comprehensive resource directory, that extends help beyond just mental health.

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:02

All right, welcome, we like. Glad you guys are joining us this morning. We just want to take a few moments today and talk about mental health in our county. And my name is Steve Horn. I work for the Jefferson R7 School District, currently serve as a middle school principal but prior to that spent five years as the mental health interventionist. With me today I have Jacqueline Brown, with Aspen Network Incorporated, and Billy Hartgrove, who's a mental health coordinator for the DeSoto School District. We want to take just a few minutes today and talk about the tool Aspen and how it can benefit families and school districts in our county. So, jacqueline, if you would take this minute and tell us a little bit about it.

Speaker 2: 0:35

So Aspen is a virtual platform. We began designing that platform around 2018, when we saw a drastic increase in the need for access to care and rising mental health concerns in our communities. And one thing that Aspen does that is somewhat unique from other platforms that are out there is we really focus on prevention by giving students the ability to refer a friend to take a self screening and to also have access to screening tools through the intervention specialist and school counselors or school social workers. It allows the school staff to really look at those lower to moderate needs so we can help connect those students and children to appropriate resources, appropriate counseling services, before they get to a crisis situation. Billy, do you want to talk a little bit about how Aspen can help if a student is in crisis?

Speaker 3: 1:31

Well, we have a self screening ID, a self ID screening Regarding the tool where students can go in, and they can take this little screening tool to help identify whether or not they're in need of services low, moderate or high and then from there the school counselor can come in and pick that up and be able to go in and do another evaluation if needed, to determine what resources they need at that moment.

Speaker 3: 2:00

And so through that screening process it does help students be able to assess or screen themselves during the holidays, during the weekends or things like that, and we have an agency that comes in through Provident Life Crisis that will contact the family if the student is in need for an emergency services.

Speaker 2: 2:20

Exactly, Steve. I always love when you talk about how students previous to Aspen, especially in your district, had maybe only 50% were getting access to resources. Can you share a little bit about that?

Speaker 1: 2:34

What we found in the past is that through our county it wasn't necessarily a lack of resources, it was the challenge of accessing those resources. And what we found through Aspen is, if we can identify specific needs and get that student to the specific service to address that need, then we find a much more higher success rate. I would just encourage families out there that we no longer have to wait until it's a full-fledged crisis to try to seek help, and so what I would ask you to do is, at the moment you recognize concerns with your child as Aspen, go to your school-based mental health professional and ask how we can begin to identify and access services. Jackie, what's the best way for families to begin to connect with Aspen?

Speaker 2: 3:20

The easiest way. Right now, everything is available and free to anyone in the St Louis region and in Jefferson County, and you can go to the website at Aspennetworkincorg anytime, day or night, and access the free resource directory. I also want to add that this is not just a resource directory for mental health tools. We have resources for transportation, housing, food access, warming centers. So if you or a loved one needs anything during this holiday season, please go to the website, check out the resource directory. Again, it's Aspennetworkincorg. Billy, this might be a great time. Would you like to explain some of the warning signs as families are going into the holiday season, what they might be looking for in their child or loved one as far as some possible concerns with mental health issues?

Speaker 3: 4:10

Well, again you have the basics where somebody might be isolating themselves away from everyone. You can also see that through. You know how are they eating, are they eating too much or not eating enough? Are they sleeping too much or not sleeping enough? So those are just some of the basic warning signs that you can tell. You know, during the holiday season it is challenging to work through some of those things, because it could be just the holiday blues, it could be seasonal affective disorder. There are a plethora of things that it could, you know, ultimately be. But for students it's just about maintaining a routine. Families should, you know, maintain a routine during all of those times. And if you start to see things that are persistent and last longer than two weeks, please reach out to your school district or someone, a healthcare professional, just to see, just a follow up, just to see if there's a little bit more going on.

Speaker 2: 5:00

And Aspen Network Inc does have the resource directory again and it also includes a lot of mental health. We have over 400 mental health providers. It could be equine therapy, music therapy, fantastic counselors in our community. But I believe also it's good to note that if they are in crisis, if you have a loved one that's in crisis at any point in time, you can call or text 988 to speak with a professional 24 seven that can help.

Speaker 1: 5:28

I'd like to wish everyone out there a happy holiday. Take care.

Speaker 2: 5:31

Happy holidays.