The Eastern Area Health Education Center (AHEC) will expand its school mental health project with a grant recently awarded by The Duke Endowment. The grant funds will allow Eastern AHEC to build upon a previous grant from The Duke Endowment to provide in-depth training on child and adolescent mental health topics to school nurses, counselors, social workers, psychologists, resource officers, administrators and others.

Eastern AHEC will use the grant to establish a Center of Excellence in School Mental Health in collaboration with schools and departments at East Carolina University, state agencies and consumer, advocacy and professional organizations. The center will coordinate continuing education in school mental health, disseminate information, promote collaboration among agencies, organizations and institutions of higher learning, and foster system changes to address mental health issues in school reform.

In addition, Eastern AHEC will:
1. Develop curriculum guides, online and classroom training on eight topics;
2. Pilot the classroom training for the eight topics;
3. Partner with the NC Collaborative on Children, Youth and Families and NC Healthy Schools to offer School Mental Health Tracks in their statewide conferences;
4. Contract with the Department of Counselor and Adult Education of the ECU College of Education to evaluate the training provided by public school personnel who have completed the School Mental Health Training Series;
5. Develop and offer an online post-baccalaureate course in school mental health, in partnership with several schools and departments at East Carolina University.

Continued access to the School Mental Health Special Collection in the AHEC Digital Library will be available. The online courses through AHEConnect are also available.

The grant began in December 2007 and will conclude in June 2008.