Enhancing Educator Engagement in School Mental Health Care Through Digital Simulation Professional Development

Area of Science:

• Educational Psychology
• School Mental Health
• Teacher Training

Background:

• Educators are crucial gatekeepers for student mental health services but lack adequate training.
• Limited professional development hinders teachers' ability to support students experiencing psychological distress.

Purpose of the Study:

• To evaluate the effectiveness of an online mental health role-play simulation for elementary school teachers.
• To assess changes in teacher attitudes and self-reported helping behaviors towards students in psychological distress.

Main Methods:

• A large-scale trial randomly assigned 18,896 elementary school teachers to an intervention or wait-list control group.
• The intervention involved a 45-90 minute online role-play simulation.
• Validated Gatekeeper Behavior Scale and self-reported helping behaviors were measured at baseline, post-intervention, and 3-month follow-up.

Main Results:

• The intervention group showed significantly higher scores on preparedness, likelihood, and self-efficacy subscales of the Gatekeeper Behavior Scale (p < .001).
• All five measured helping behaviors were significantly higher in the intervention group at follow-up compared to the control group at baseline.

Conclusions:

• A brief online role-play simulation is an effective strategy for enhancing teacher attitudes and behaviors.
• This intervention improves teachers' capacity to serve as positive mental health gatekeepers in schools.
• The findings support the integration of such simulations into teacher training programs to bolster school mental health support.