Graduate Program in Children’s Mental Health: Systems of Care Program Makes Registry of Innovative Practices

FMHI’s new Graduate Program in Children’s Mental Health, although only in its first year, has already received national recognition. It has been selected as an “Innovative Practice” in children’s mental health by the children’s panel of the Annapolis Coalition on Workforce Development. The Annapolis Coalition is the country’s leading policy group specifically focusing on workforce development.

A notification letter signed by Michael Hoge, Senior Science and Policy Advisor, and John Morris, Executive Director of the Annapolis Coalition states, “We congratulate you on this award and applaud your efforts to improve the quality and relevance of education and training in behavioral health. The program was selected based on significance, novelty, transferability, and effectiveness.”

Developed by Carol MacKinnon-Lewis as part of the RTC projects, the program helps to make training in children’s mental health, with a specific focus on systems of care, more available nationally by developing a web-based graduate certificate in children’s mental health. The first class, taught by Bob Friedman, Rene Anderson, Nate Israel, and Rich Puddy, with assistance from Laurel Friedman, served 38 students, and 20 certificate students have been accepted for the 2006-2007 academic year. Evaluations by the students have been very positive.

“ I have found the classes, information, delivery methods, and the interactions with other students and professors to be exemplary,” said Sue Smith, Ed.E., Co-CEO of the Georgia Parent Support Network. “I am gaining a great deal of knowledge about (other students) work, life experiences and personal situations that are contributing to my educational experience. I have worked in Systems of Care for over 20 years and thought I had explored all of the literature available. This class has combined the most current research and literature with information from business and other disciplines to take research for Systems of Care to a higher level. I have been able to finish a lesson and translate it the same day into action steps for our staff and agency. (The Network) will serve over 600 youth with serious emotional disturbance/ behavioral disorders this year and the class I am currently taking at FMHI is helping to make this service more effective and more researched-based.”

“ I cannot express strongly enough how helpful this program has been for our community,” said Beth Jordan Armstrong, M.S., Kentucky Department for Mental Health and Mental Retardation Services SOC Administrator. “There is much opportunity for interaction with both classmates and instructors, and I have found that the program meets my needs as someone with 15 years of experience in the field in a way that traditional learning programs might not. Our current SOC community just began Year Three, and we are hitting significant road blocks in areas of governance, training, and implementation of evidence-based practices. The first course in this program has helped me see reasons why we are currently encountering these problems, as well as helped identify possible ways to address these and find solutions.”

Dennis F. Mohatt, Director of the Mental Health Program of the Western Interstate Commission for Higher Education ( an organization that has worked to improve mental health care for over a half-century) expressed his feelings regarding the need for workforce training. “Despite the well-documented prevalence of mental health problems in infants, children and adolescents, there is an enormous shortage of qualified and appropriately trained individuals to meet those needs,” said Mohatt. “WICHE has examined workforce needs in the behavioral health field and have found no professional training programs geared toward either children’s mental health professional practice, policy, or program management, with the exception of pediatric psychiatry residencies. USF is at the threshold to establish a virtual center of excellence by coordinating the expertise of talented faculty within the field.”

“ The hallmark of the program has been the rapid nature at which universities from all parts of the country have come together to develop this program, which speaks to the great need that exists for workforce education and training in the children’s mental health field.” said Dr. MacKinnon-Lewis.
This semester, courses will be taught on financing (by Mary Armstrong), on cultural competence (by Mario Hernandez), and interdisciplinary systems of care (by Terri Shelton of UNC--Greensboro).

“ We are delighted by the recognition that the program has received from the Annapolis Coalition,” said Bob Friedman. “We are even more excited at how pleased the students were, and at the progress they made during the semester in understanding systems of care. Personally, this was my first web-based class, and I was very fortunate to have great help. I found that I not only enjoyed teaching on the web, but that it lent itself very well to active student participation, and careful review of material.”