From Programmes to Planning: How Schools Define and Prioritise Mental Health Problem Prevention

Schools play an important role in preventing mental health problems among children and young people. While existing frameworks describe the components of school-based prevention, less is known about how schools themselves conceptualise prevention and what they see as priorities for development. We conducted four workshops with 18 school staff members from 13 educational institutions. Participants identified current and desired prevention activities and prioritised those they considered most important to develop. The listed activities were analysed using qualitative content analysis to create a data-driven categorisation of prevention activities. 12 categories of activities emerged under two overarching themes: prevention delivery (activities aimed at students or parents) and prevention organisation (conditions necessary for effective delivery, such as planning, cooperation, staff support, and training). While schools reported widespread implementation of universal prevention-related activities, their highest priorities for improvement were organisational, particularly systematic planning, coordination, and ensuring sufficient and supported personnel. The findings suggest that school staff view organisational capacity-building as an integral part of prevention, underlining the need for prevention policies and systems that recognise and support the organisational work schools do to sustain mental health problem prevention.