Innovations in Practice: 'Go-to' Educator Training on the mental health competencies of educators in the secondary school setting: a program evaluation.

Abstract

Educators can play an important role in early identification and triage of youth with mental disorders. This paper reports findings of a program evaluation of the 'Go-To' Educator Training in a secondary school setting. Pre- and posttests were administered. Participant mean scores on mental health competencies changed from 12 (40%) (standard deviation [SD]=4.3) pretraining to 21 (70%) (SD=3.3) posttraining, t(119)=25.6, p<.0001, d=2.3. Participant attitude mean scores improved from 49.9 (SD=4.6) pretraining, to 51.5 (SD=4.2), t(115)=4.3, p<.0001, d=0.36. This training is a useful intervention to help educators identify youth with mental disorders and link them to appropriate services.