Upgrades to a respite area in Buchser Middle School are providing a more comprehensive focus on mental health.
A $225,000 county grant has allowed the school, located at 1111 Bellomy St. in Santa Clara, to hire a Spanish-speaking wellness coach and improve its calming space. Those improvements include adding furniture and redesigning the area.
Buchser Middle School is one of a dozen schools across the county that received money to upgrade its wellness center. Earlier this year, the county announced it would dole out $13.2 million in grant money to fund 40 projects—28 new centers and 12 upgrades.
Next to the school’s cafeteria in a “multi-purpose” room, Buchser Middle School’s calming space features a variety of relaxing amenities. Among them, lo-fi music, art supplies, toys, comfortable seating, movies and yoga mats.
“The purpose of the calming [space] is really to help students with their own internal capacity to re-regulate,” said Brenda Carrillo, director of student services at Santa Clara Unified School District (SCUSD). “The ability to upgrade and enhance the space has made a difference. To use the student language: it is a ‘cool’ space.”
Since its upgrade, Carrillo said the school has already noticed an uptick in students using the space. Completing the upgrade by the start of the year was paramount, she added, saying that it is a very stressful time for many students.
District data shows that wellness visits have increased over the past three years.
The district is trying to envision what the future of mental health will look like and re-evaluate progress each year, Carrillo said. Grant money for the calming space bolsters SCUSD’s ability to “empower young people to learn valuable skills that they will need later in life.”
“We are very committed to the idea of students having health and balance, to have their mental health prioritized so that learning can happen,” she said.
Managed by the nonprofit Valley Health Foundation, the wellness center expansion program aims to address mental health challenges facing Silicon Valley students, according to a county press release.
Federal coronavirus relief money added $5 million to the grant pool. Another $5 million in state money, $2 million from the county and $1 million and $80,000 philanthropic donations rounded out the grant pool.
At Buchser Middle School, students check in, indicating their stress level upon arrival and again when they exit.
John Shafer, SCUSD’s wellness coordinator, said the calming space has a “spa-like feel.”
“The literature and research show that if you have regulating activities, you can reduce the problems at a school that are related to stress,” Shafer said. “It is not about the elimination of stress, in predictable regulated amounts. You need stress. That is how you become a stronger person.”
In recent years, anxiety among young people has risen, Shafer said. Anxiety is just a symptom of something “more sinister.” While acute stress is healthy, chronic stress is debilitating, he added.
The likely cause of this anxiety, Shafer said, is a disconnect between kids and “mature, regulated adults.” Too frequently, kids take their social cues from other kids. Having an area like the calming center allows kids to have interactions with emotionally stable adults that make them feel safe, he added.
“For kids, it is about feeling valued, heard and unconditionally accepted,” Shafer said.
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