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To address the lack of awareness and understanding regarding mental health and mental disorders, schools should integrate mental health education into their curriculum.

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Lack of awareness of mental illness issues leads to ignorance and stigma which makes people feel unsafe.

A 2013 poll by the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation found that 47 percent of respondents would be uncomfortable living next door to someone who had a serious mental illness, and 41 percent would be uncomfortable working with someone who had a serious mental illness

A 2016 Harris poll found that 53 percent of respondents didn't know that people with anxiety disorders are at risk for self-harm

A survey of 4600 people organized by researchers at Michigan State University, showed that 32 percent of the people who took the survey couldn't identify the signs of prescription drug abuse, 80 percent didn't think it was a treatable issue, less than 50 percent could recognize the signs of anxiety, and the vast majority of the respondents had no idea about how depression is treated.

A 2003 survey in England found that 63 percent of the population appears to believe that fewer than 10 percent of all people will experience a mental illness, while in reality around 1 in 5 adults suffer from mental illness.

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In certain sectors of society, saying " most Americans don't understand mental health" might be be met with howls of protest. For instance, if you're a millennial, that statement might be genuinely untrue for you. You're part of a generation which has, by and large, become increasingly comfortable with discussing mental health and seeing it depicted realistically around you; a 2015 report by the Anxiety and Depression Association of American found that 60 percent of college-aged Americans viewed seeking professional mental health treatment as a sign of strength, not weakness - a marked break with the stigma found in past generations.

But mental health literacy in most segments of the population - and even among many young people themselves - simply isn't that common. Though the National Alliance on Mental Illness notes that 18.5 percent of U.S. adults experience mental illness in a given year, a 2013 poll by the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation found that 47 percent of respondents would be uncomfortable living next door to someone who had a serious mental illness, and 41 percent would be uncomfortable working with someone who had a serious mental illness; similarly, a 2016 Harris poll found that 53 percent of respondents didn't know that people with anxiety disorders are at risk for self-harm. Sifting through all these facts, some questions are clear: why don't people know enough, and why does it matter so much?

It's Mental Health Awareness Month, so it's prime time to look at our own levels of knowledge about mental health disorders and see what's lacking. In a perfect world, we'd all be able to reel off all the diagnostic criteria for bipolar II disorder or automatically be able to compare different treatment options for generalized anxiety disorder; but, alas, our world is far from perfect. But while perfection may be a long way off, we can take steps to become more knowledgeable - which is important, because mental health illiteracy can have far more serious consequences than just looking uninformed after you accidentally make some uneducated remarks. Community attitudes about mental health can encourage or discourage people from seeking treatment - and that can impact the course of someone's life.

Bustle talked to Michigan State University's Dr. Courtney Cuthbertson, one of the scientists behind a new mental health survey that's provoking old questions anew, to find out how little Americans know about mental health - and why that matters.

Ignorance About Mental Illness Increases Stigma

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The latest findings to support the desperate need for more widespread understanding of mental health issues come from researchers at Michigan State University, who just released a study that points to a problem with mental health awareness in the U.S. The study surveyed 4,600 people via the internet about their awareness of various issues, from anxiety and depression to prescription drug abuse. The results were, well, not great. Dr. Courtney Cuthbertson, who worked on the survey under leader Dr Mark Skidmore, explained how it worked to Bustle:

"The survey asked participants to read a vignette describing a person experiencing one of those four mental health issues. Participants were then asked to select what they thought was going on with that person, to identify what participants thought would be appropriate help strategies, and to respond to several statements about stigma towards someone who experiences what the person in the vignette was experiencing. The questions to measure stigma asked participants to respond thinking about themselves and separately about their communities, to statements like "If [I/most people in my community] had a problem like [this person]'s I would not tell anyone.""

32 percent of the people who took the survey couldn't identify the signs of prescription drug abuse, 80 percent didn't think it was a treatable issue, less than 50 percent could recognize the signs of anxiety, and the vast majority of the respondents had no idea about how depression is treated. The multi-branch approach of the survey - targeting not only what people thought mental disorders "look like," but whether they understand how they're actually meant to be treated - gave a big-picture look at just where more information needed to be targeted. Unfortunately, the answer seems to be "everywhere."

The study results aren't a one-off, either. The problem of mental health literacy, as it's called, has been reiterated in studies across the world; a 2003 survey in England, for instance, found that 63 percent of the population appears to believe that fewer than 10 percent of all people will experience a mental illness. The problem? The number is actually one in four. That's a huge difference, and creates the false impression of rarity - which can lead to stigma, which can in turn discourage people from seeking help. So what's causing this, and why is it so important?

Why Are So Many Of Us So Confused By Mental Health?

There is, according to experts, a kind of cycle effect when it comes to ignorance of mental health issues and stigma surrounding them. The less people know about mental disorders, according to the British Journal of Psychiatry, the more likely they are to be afraid or confused by them, or to hold beliefs that penalize or misunderstand the mentally ill. Stigma both stems from and creates more ignorance; when something's seen as socially taboo, people are less inclined to learn more about it; and when we don't learn about mental illness, we're less able to identify a mental health concern emerging among a friend, family member or ourselves, or understand what treatment options are available.

The Michigan State study also added new understandings about factors that seem to interfere with understanding of mental illness. You are less likely to recognize depression in others, for example, if you're from a higher-income background, live in an urban area or are young, and the same factors are in play for recognizing anxiety.

Personal experience is the swiftest way to learn about mental illness; people with their own difficulties or those with family members or close friends and partners who have disorders tend to score the highest on literacy tests. Similarly, a 2007 study in the Medical Journal of Australia noted that women tend to test better on mental health literacy than men. Some mental health problems are indeed more common among women, but by and large the issue affects both genders equally; women's advantage may simply be through societal "caring" roles, which mean they're more exposed to the realities of mental illness and mood disorders.

But part of mental health ignorance is also cultural, shaped by messages from media and the prevailing climate of beliefs. A 2016 study of Japanese adults, for instance, found that if they believed depression and schizophrenia were caused by certain "personality characteristics", they were more likely to believe that mentally ill people were dangerous and unpredictable. Ignorance doesn't necessarily come from nowhere - and it can cause more harm than you might think.

What's The Real Cost Of Ignorance About Mental Health?

There are a couple of obvious downsides to people's lack of education about mental health problems. The big issue, of course, is that not knowing what a mental disorder looks like, or how to treat one when it appears, stands in the way of effective diagnosis and treatment, not only for oneself but for others - and stigma provides additional obstacles, because it makes the disorder not only invisible but something to be concealed or deliberately avoided.

The reality is that 25 percent of all adults will experience mental health issues in their lifetime, 10 percent of all children will, and while many of those disorders will not be so problematic as to require hospitalization or significantly disrupt their lives, they do require treatment and understanding. The undertreatment problem in mental health is pretty spectacular; it was estimated in 2008 that 67 percent of the entire US population with mental health issues gets no help whatsoever, and that over two-thirds of mentally ill people globally aren't being treated at all.

And the problem is exponentially worse in countries that don't have a high GDP or developed infrastructure; in those countries, noted a 2015 study, "the majority of people with mental, neurological, and substance use (MNS) disorders [are] receiving no or inadequate care".

In the face of this sort of problem, understanding how to get around ignorance and stigma becomes incredibly important. But not all kinds of ignorance provoke the same reactions. A fascinating study from the EU in 2010 found that a community's specific misinformation about mental health impacted how community members dealing with mental health issues reacted.

In places where people tended to believe that the mentally ill were to blame for their own problems, those who were concerned about themselves or others weren't very likely to seek help. But in groups where the prevailing belief in the community was that mentally ill people were dangerous or unable to live healthy lives, people were actually motivated to go find treatment. Obviously, neither of those attitudes are ideal - but they point to the fact that different strategies need to be applied for different situations when dealing with ignorance or confusion about mental illnesses.

On a very basic level, ignorance about mental health issues costs lives and a significant amount of human happiness. Understanding what disorders look like, how they work, and how they can be treated is a big public good. It's a large effort, but we can take our own steps. If you feel comfortable with talking to a coworker or acquaintance about mental illness, give it a try this month. It might not change the whole world, but it could change at least one person's mind.

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This Study Shows Why America's Ignorance About Mental Health Is Hurting Us

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In certain sectors of society, saying "most Americans don't understand mental health" might be be met with howls of protest. For instance, if you're a millennial, that statement might be genuinely untrue for you. You're part of a generation which...

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Lack of awareness and education regarding mental health can have serious repercussion. If people don't understand mental health issues, they are likely to respond to signs of mental illness with fear, discomfort, and shame which often keeps them from seeking help.

Also, people who don't know about mental disorders cannot be very understanding or empathetic towards other who suffer from mental illness. People's ignorance only increases the stigma surrounding mental illness.

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Overcoming a Lack of Awareness of Mental Health Issues

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Some of us manage volunteers 'at the coalface', others work as 'second tier' co-ordinators, developing national volunteer programmes with little or no day-to-day contact with volunteers, still others act as volunteer 'brokers' - volunteer bureau staff, bridge builders or support staff who match volunteers to external placements in the community.

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I believe that the most effective way to educate people on mental health and mental disabilities is to incorporate mental health education into high school health curriculum.

Starting in July 2018, New York became first state to require mental health education. New York’s School Mental Health (SMH) Program forms relationships with schools and integrates mental health education for every grade. Some facets of mental health which are addressed include the importance of self-care, the idea that mental health should be regarded with the same concern as physical health, ways to recognize signs of problems, relationship between mental health and negative behaviors, and the impact of stigma.

Mental health education is also required in Virginia, where the basic premise is that physical education or health education curricula for ninth and 10th graders have a mental health component.

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New York and Virginia Become the First States to Require Mental Health Education in Schools

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New York, Virginia will be the first states to mandate mental health education in schools following a rise in depression, suicidal thoughts.

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Some barriers:
-Because academic education is a school's priority, they often don't have the time to sped educating students on mental health.

-many families have financial constraints or have trouble coordinating transportation to places where their kids receive education and other mental health services.
-I think that mental health education should be incorporated into the curriculum of health or physical education class. A school would not have to compromise any time spent in traditional classes if they set aside time in their health classes to educate students on mental health. If this plan were implemented, a family would not have to worry about transportation or extra costs.

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Taking about mental health in schools and can help destigmatize mental illness. Students who talk about mental illness can better understand themselves and their classmates.

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We've all been there. On the brink of an emotional breakdown, (maybe even in the middle of one) concerned about school, extracurriculars, college, what the heck we're going to be and in the future. Every negative emotion you know bottled up and boiling, and feeling as if it's only a moment before you spontaneously combust. You lash out at friends and family, can't focus on school work, or maybe even completely disengage from it all. do

But the question we must ask ourselves is: how did we get here? And more importantly: what the hell do we do now?

Mental health is something that is rarely talked about within schools (whether that be elementary, middle, high school, or beyond) and yet it is something that is guaranteed to affect everybody's life in one way or another.

We've all gotten sick before right? Sprained an ankle, maybe even broken a bone? And we all know that if we're hurt, that we should go and see a doctor, fix what needs to be fixed, and move on with our lives. But for some odd reason, we don't view our mental health in the same light. We will all struggle with our mental health, yet will rarely -if ever- do anything about it. And as of right now, our schools do not help very much in getting the help or education we need.

Don't get me wrong, our health classes do brush up on the definitions of some things; depression, anxiety, maybe even eating disorders if you're lucky. Other than that though, mental illnesses are viewed as these scary, faraway things that will never truly affect us. A topic too taboo to discuss with the youngsters. Something that means, if we do happen to be that the one in a billion instance of being affected, that we can basically kiss the rest of our life goodbye.

Have I got some news for you, buckaroo.

The statistics surrounding mental illnesses are -to put it lightly- incredibly jarring. One in five of every youth aged 13 to 18 have, or will have, a serious mental illness. Around 8.6% of all of the youth in America have severe depression, however a staggering 76% of those affected -that's around 1.6 million kids- have received inadequate, or simply zero treatment for it at all.

Nearly 50% of adults with chronic mental illnesses developed diagnosable symptoms by the age of 14. Suicide is the third leading cause of death in youth ages 10 to 24, with 90% of those who have died due to suicide having had an underlying mental illness. I could keep going, but these facts barely even graze the tip of the iceberg in regards to mental health and it's affect on our society, especially our youth, today. Yet, the discussion around mental health is still incredibly lacking (if it's even there to begin with).

Based on my own personal experience, I think that the stigmatization of these topics has made it near impossible for students to realize the overbearing presence of mental health struggles amongst our age demographic. Our society has consistently romanticized and ridiculed the topic, to the point where the only mention of mental illnesses are when they're used as a descriptor, derogatory term, joke, or some crude combination of all three. I mean, how many of us have heard -or even said- phrases along the lines of "I'm, like, super OCD" or "ugh, she is so bipolar" or "I wish I was anorexic."

Films and other media have romanticized many of these illnesses to be seen as desirable or "quirky" personality traits. We don't even realize that it's happening, however, mental illnesses are constantly being framed in a wonky light, therefore further subconsciously perpetuating our negative association with it's presence. And unfortunately, this stigma surrounding mental health is only growing.

So what do we do now? How do we get rid of something that is so deeply ingrained within our society?

That's where schools come in.

Ah yes school, the dreaded center of knowledge and (let's be more realistic here) stress. But, there is a power schools have that we often ignore. Schools are the epicenters of education (well, ) and are one of the few places where we get to learn about issues that are prevalent, (normally) in the hopes that one day, currently may be the ones to solve them.

The first step towards solving a problem is recognizing it's a problem in the first place. And somehow, even with its heavy impact and undeniable looming presence in our day-to-day lives, the topic of mental health has been completely avoided by our education system. Now, this is not our schools fault, but I'd be lying if I said that we couldn't do completely more in emphasizing the importance of mental health education and awareness within our schools. Starting off by acknowledging theses issues from the get-go. way

One of the biggest problems I faced while struggling with my own mental health, was simply having no idea where to go or what to do about it. I felt ashamed of my actions, I felt hatred towards myself, and I felt as if all of my struggles were somehow "invalid" and didn't or need "treatment." Having discussed this with many mental health advocates, it seems as though these are recurring feelings amongst nearly everyone who has ever had to reach out for help in regards to their mental health. And every single one of those people would all tell you the same thing: that treatment is not only helpful, but absolutely, positively, matter in order to get better. necessary

Nearly 20% of youth aged 13 to 18 have a diagnosable mental illnesses, yet our schools barely educate us on what these mental illnesses are. We need to have education on these issues starting from elementary and middle school -where these issues first start arising. We need resources at the ready, with mental health information known just as well as we know the quadratic formula.

One of the hardest parts of learning about your mental health is learning to take care of it, but if that's something we learn as part of our general education, that problem can be completely erased.

In response to this lack of education, and (honestly) out of sheer curiosity, I decided to hold a poll on my Instagram. In this poll, I asked six questions in relation to mental health and mental illness education within schools, and asked people to respond to them with a yes or no answer. The results of the poll can be found at the end of this article, but there were two questions in particular whose results, I think, perfectly sum up how mental health education is handled within our schools today.

In my first question, I asked whether people thought that mental health should be discussed more in schools. Ninety-four percent of them answered yes. Next, I asked whether their schools taught about mental illnesses and/or mental health and how to deal with them. Seventy-three percent of them answered no.

Can you see the issue here? It's not the fact that kids don't want to learn about these issues. In fact, it can be seen that they'd prefer it if they did. But when more than 70% of them aren't provided with any information on these topics in the first place, how will they ever be able to acknowledge, and even further, solve the issues regarding them?

One of the main reasons that mental health and illness awareness is so stigmatized can be traced back to that fact that we aren't educated on what these things are in the first place. We aren't aware of the fact that will struggle with their mental health, regardless of whether they have a mental illness or not. We aren't aware of the fact that even if we don't have a mental illness ourselves, we are guaranteed to know someone who does, based purely off of statistics. everyone We aren't aware of the fact that our mental health is identical to our physical health, in that, if we don't take care of it, it slowly deteriorate. We aren't aware of the staggering statistics about mental illnesses and how they affect our society. We aren't given the tools to know what common mental health struggles are or how to take care of them. We aren't given the resources necessary to properly seek additional help if we need it. will

Coming from someone who struggled with bulimia from when she was 12 until I was 15, who didn't understand the extent of danger she was putting herself in everyday she didn't get help, who felt alone, who didn't know that recovery was possible -let alone even a thing , who has watched her some of her closest friends nearly lose their lives to suicide, who talked to nearly hundreds of other students before she realized just how relevant this issue is: we need proper mental health education within our schools.

Not just for that every 1 in 5 statistic, not just for all of the too-young lives lost to suicide, not just for the millions of kids who have to struggle in silence everyday, but for everybody.

Because mental illness is what it's been portrayed as in our media. Because our mental health is something we should brush under the rug. Because 1.6 million children should not have to suffer with a diagnosable medical issue without treatment because it isn't seen as what it is: a medical issue. Because, yes, some diseases are chronic, but all of them can be made livable with proper treatment. And most importantly because we are not, and should never be, alone in these struggles.

Without a proper education on these topics, we will never be able to move forward in eliminating the stigma around them. There are so many other aspects in regards to mental health's presence in our society today, but we need to start . Without resources initially being provided to our youth, these jarring numbers will only continue to rise as we grow older.

So, let's get this conversation going. Start to talk about these issues more. Reach out to your schools about providing resources and raising awareness. Do not ignore your mental health. Try to be more aware of the people surrounding you and how they may be struggling as well, I can guarantee you'll be shocked at the sheer amount of people who are affected; whether directly or indirectly.

Because if there is one thing I can tell you with the utmost confidence, it's that you deserve to live your life to the fullest. That your struggles are valid and should be treated as such. That we can be the force to change the course of how mental health is viewed and treated within our daily lives.

We are the future. Let's make sure that we do everything in our power to ensure that we're a progressive, aware, supportive, and healthy one.

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Instagram Poll:
I asked six yes or no questions in regards to mental health & illness awareness, these are the results:

Question 1: Do you think mental health should be discussed more in school and/or daily life in general?

Question 2: Have you ever struggles with your own mental health?

Question 3: Do you know someone who has struggled with their mental health and/or has had a mental illness?

Question 4: Do you ever feel like you have to ignore your mental health struggles (whether it be due to to school, gender roles, familial, societal, or any other reasons)?

Question 5: Does your school teach you about mental illnesses and/or mental health and how to deal with one or both of them?

Question 6: If yes to the last question, does your school provide accommodations, resources, and/or help for those who may struggles with mental health issues?

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Sources for Statistics:
https://www.nami.org/Learn-More/Mental-Health-By-the-Numbers

Mental Health America- Facts, Stats, and Data
http://www.mentalhealthamerica.net/issues/state-mental-health-america http://www.mentalhealthamerica.net/issues/mental-health-america-youth-data

US Department of Health and Human Services- Mental Health Myths and Facts:
https://www.mentalhealth.gov/basics/myths-facts/index.html

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Opinion: Why we need to talk about mental health in schools

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We've all been there. On the brink of an emotional breakdown, (maybe even in the middle of one) concerned about school, extracurriculars, college, what the heck we're going to be and do in the future. Every negative emotion you know bottled up and boiling, and feeling as if it's only a moment before you spontaneously...

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Improper ratios of psychologists, counselors, and nurses to students in schools.

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February 15
Grief counselors are always made available to help students when there is a traumatic event at a school, such as this week, when a gunman entered a Florida high school and fired a military-style assault weapon, killing 17 people. While health experts say counseling after a tragedy is vital, too many schools don't have anywhere near enough health professionals to help students before the catastrophes.

Consider:

In U.S. public schools today, it's estimated there is one school psychologist for every 1,381 students. The National Association of School Psychologists recommends one psychologist for every 500 to 700 students (which itself makes very busy work days for psychologists).

Let's turn to school counselors.

According to the latest available information from the American School Counselor Association, there was one counselor for every 482 students in 2014-2015. It's nearly twice what the association recommends: one counselor for every 250 students (which makes for very busy days for school counselors.)

And then there are school-based nurses. The National Association of School Nurses and the National Association of State School Nurse Consultants recommend that every student have direct access to a school nurse, though some states have recommended there be one school nurse for every 750 students in the healthy student population (which makes for a busy day for school nurses).

Yet a 2017 survey by the National Association of School Nurses found that only 39 percent of private and public schools in the United States have full-time nurses. In North Carolina, for example, a new legislative study found that the state would need to spend up to $79 million a year in additional money to meet the 1 to 750 nurse-student ratio in public schools.

School-based psychologists, counselors and nurses do related but different things for students, but they are all professionals who are supposed to be part of the human scaffolding constructed around students to help them do their best in school.

According to the Association for Children's Mental Health, addressing mental health needs in schools is vital because "1 in 5 children and youth have a diagnosable emotional, behavioral or mental health disorder, and 1 in 10 young people have a mental health challenge that is severe enough to impair how they function at home, school or in the community." And it says that many estimates show that among kids aged 6 to 17, "at least one-half and many estimate as many as 80 percent" don't receive the mental health care they require.

"It's a huge issue," said Amanda Nickerson, director of the Alberti Center for Bullying Abuse Prevention at the University at Buffalo Graduate School of Education, who is attending the annual convention in Chicago of the National Association of School Psychologists. "We do not have enough mental health professionals to meet the increasingly complex needs of the students that are walking through the door."

Nickerson said the inevitable calls for immediate action after a shooting often miss the point.

"We are getting better providing, unfortunately in some ways, the crisis intervention, but that's after something terrible happens," she said. "As we look toward solutions after something like this happens, people automatically go to highly expensive hardware sorts of solutions. Why don't we have metal detectors? Where are the cameras? Where are the guards?

"I'm not saying those things aren't important," she said. "But to create a safe and secure environment, we have to address psychological safety and connectedness and how we are resolving conflicts that doesn't involve more conflict. That is critically important, and our school-based mental health experts are trained to do that. But there aren't enough people and not enough hours in the day currently with the way our staffing is."

Though research and common sense say that schools should be properly staffed with health professionals, that has not been the focus of modern school reformers, who have focused not on the health of students but on testing metrics.

That was true in Democratic and Republican presidential administrations, including the current one. President Trump's statement about the shooting in South Florida, which left 17 people dead, said in part:

Our administration is working closely with local authorities to investigate the shooting and learn everything we can. We are committed to working with state and local leaders to help secure our schools, and tackle the difficult issue of mental health.

Yet on Monday, his administration released a 2019 budget proposal that mental health professionals said does not show a commitment to tackling the many issues affecting mental health.

The National Association of School Psychologists, for example, expressed "deep concern" with specific proposed items, including gutting significant programs in the federal K-12 law. The American Psychological Association said while the budget includes additional resources to address the nation's opioid epidemic, improve veterans' health care and fund scientific research, it "would decimate critical education, justice and behavioral health workforce programs if enacted."

There is something else missing in the United States that affects the mental health of students, as explained in this Washington Post story about mass shootings at U.S. schools compared with other countries:

There's also another crucial difference with the United States: extensive, mandatory health insurance, which allows schools to have direct and immediate access to psychologists and intervention teams.

[Europeans had school shootings, too. Then they did something about it.]
If schools are calling in grief counselors, it's already too late to avoid disaster. And if Americans really cared about having the personnel in schools to address mental health needs, then schools would be adequately staffed with the professionals who students need to be healthy and do their best.

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Analysis | If Americans really cared about students' mental health, these school ratios would be very different

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February 15 Grief counselors are always made available to help students when there is a traumatic event at a school, such as this week, when a gunman entered a Florida high school and fired a military-style assault weapon, killing 17 people.

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Mental health could possibly be part of the solution to the problem of school shootings. Students without support from people in their school or education about mental illness are less likely to be involves in acts of violence such s school shootings.

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Less than two weeks ago, Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School senior Emma Gonzalez delivered what amounts to a post-millennial rebuke to every preceding American generation for failing to protect her and her peers. She spoke out against our overly permissive gun laws, the corporate interests that maintain them and the cultural affiliations that make many of us reluctant to accept change.

As Gen-Xers, our thoughts went back to Columbine, our flashbulb memory of the first mass school shooting in our lifetimes. As we've been forced to bear witness over the years, we see similar circumstances playing out: a marginalized student (or former student) with a troubled past or a resentment commits a heinous act.

Lethal power means restriction matters. If 91 percent of suicide attempts with a firearm are fatal, but only 8 percent without a firearm are fatal, think of the lives saved and tragedies averted from implementing common-sense gun restrictions. Imagine the proportionate decrease for homicide attempts.

Yet time after time, we watch mass shootings lead to a call for government action, and time after time the government does nothing. This time, high school students who'd just survived a shooting at their own school boarded buses to Tallahassee and watched as their state legislature refused to reconsider a ban on assault rifles like the one that killed their friends a week before.

If we have taken anything away from Parkland, it's that we no longer have the luxury of delegating the care of our most marginalized students.

Mental health care access also matters. Governments should fund more robust school counseling programs so that students get care long before their feelings of despair and isolation metastasize into violence. But meeting that need will involve cumbersome debates, rebudgeting and hiring. All of that takes time.

Meanwhile, our efforts to address mental health in school have limitations. Researchers who study the impact of mental illness stigma have found that students identified as needing mental health services sometimes find that their friends then avoid them, their family members pity and distrust them, and their teachers fear them and underestimate their abilities.

So while we wait for governments to restrict access to guns and increase access to effective mental health care, what can teachers do?

If we have taken anything away from Parkland, it's that we no longer have the luxury of delegating the care of our most marginalized students to what passes for community mental health. Nor can we siphon off responsibility to providers in our schools - guidance counselors, psychologists, and social workers - or to contexts like advisory or health class that don't command the same respect or rigor from our students. Teachers might fear exploring mental health, a province we're told isn't ours. But apart from parents, who knows kids better than teachers?
RELATED: Teachers' Lounge: A student's obituary should never say 'gunned down while studying for chemistry'
No other profession is better placed to gain the trust of a student in crisis, or a student who might come forward about a struggling peer. Who is better placed than a teacher to organize a student's environment and be a source of consistent support? Our lives may depend on our willingness to brave the shoals of the distressed and the defeated, the socially ostracized and the academically remedial.

As teachers, we can decide to make school more than a place where students learn the skills to cleverly navigate the internet for the purpose of acquiring high-powered weapons. Or making homemade munitions, as in the case of the Columbine murderers. Even obtaining the capital, locating suppliers and identifying safe storage requires, in the darkest way, what we might call initiative, problem solving, creativity and attention to detail. When we teach such "21st century skills" and traditional academic knowledge, what are we helping students use it for?

Is the only purpose of school "to ensure that students graduating from high school are prepared to take credit bearing introductory courses in two- or four-year college programs or enter the workforce," or can school also become a place where students learn how they want to treat themselves, each other, and their world?

Gonzalez's speech was so moving ... because at the worst moment in her school's history, she took charge of her learning and her life.

Emma Gonzalez's speech was so moving not only because she had her facts correct and made sound arguments, but because at the worst moment in her school's history, she took charge of her learning and her life.

Maybe an important element of preventing violence and suicide is empowering all students to make their lives meaningful, in and beyond school. Maybe if students learn how to accept feelings of frustration, fear and embarrassment, they won't need to avoid those feelings by hurting themselves or someone else.

As teachers, we can ask ourselves these questions:

Who at school is empowered and why?

In what contexts at school are students choosing actions consistent with their values?

In what contexts are students struggling to find meaning and fulfillment?

How can we use our academic classes as opportunities for students to explore and enact their values?

Who is most marginalized, and how can we help them reconnect with their families, peers and teachers?

What further support do students need, and how can we help them get it?

So on March 14, when we walk out, we are putting legislators on notice that they'd better make restricting access to firearms their immediate priority. When we walk back in, we can step up to a role where we are choosing to measure ourselves not only by the academic and athletic achievements of students who already feel successful, but also by the extent to which all students turn school into a source of meaning and vitality.
The PBS NewsHour's Teachers' Lounge blog, written by teachers or school-related staff, gives the public a glimpse into how current events affect life inside schools. Sign up for the PBS NewsHour Education mailer here.

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Opinion: To prevent school shootings, can mental health be taught?

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Less than two weeks ago, Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School senior Emma Gonzalez delivered what amounts to a post-millennial rebuke to every preceding American generation for failing to protect her and her peers. She spoke out against our overly permissive gun laws, the corporate interests that maintain them and the cultural affiliations that make many of us reluctant to accept change.