The Gloucester School Board met Tuesday night in the T.C. Walker Education Center Auditorium for several agenda items, including a presentation on mental health at Gloucester County Public Schools.
Director of School Counseling at Gloucester High School Matthew Lord, GCPS Psychologist Christina Mahoney and Abingdon Counselor Lindsey Mahnke gave a presentation on Supporting Student Mental Health.
Mahnke discussed mental health services offered at the county’s elementary schools, including student recognition programs, classroom management systems and weekly social-emotional learning lessons. Four out of the five elementary schools use the program Second Step for SEL which includes units on Growth Mindset and Goal-Setting, Emotion Management, Empathy and Kindness and Problem-Solving.
School board member Darren Post voiced his concerns about the Second Step program, pertaining to anti-racism and anti-bias content, specifically the possibility of Critical Race Theory and gender-supporting health care (including puberty suppressants) being taught to students.
“There are a lot of resources on the Second Step program, direct links from their website concerning a lot of things I believe would fall under Gov. [Glenn] Youngkin’s definition of inherently divisive concepts,” said Post.
School board member Robin Rice pulled up the Second Step website during the meeting and searched specifically for CRT and transgender content on the website and found nothing.
“I’ve spent a lot of time as a parent and one who gets reports from their kid like Ms. Rice does and these are not topics that have been brought [up],” said chair Troy Andersen.
Post directed Rice to the anti-racism and anti-bias resources webpage for Second Step when she asked for a direct link to CRT or transgender content.
“I’m on that but that’s not Critical Race Theory,” said Rice. “I’m looking for transgender or Critical Race Theory.”
“This is not the conversation I want to have tonight because it’s taking away the focus which we’ve heard over and over from Mr. [Tyler] Bagent [student advisory committee representative], the role of mental health in our schools,” said Andersen. “We have a great program that we’ve heard about tonight that’s helping us get there with our students.
“So, to me, it’s not the time to take away,” said Andersen. “Anti-racism is not Critical Race Theory. Anti-racism is not bias. We have a policy in place that says what we’re not going to do. And nothing I’ve seen violates our policy on any of this stuff. Because you don’t like it doesn’t make it wrong.”
Andersen directed his next comments to Post and school board member Carlton Drew.
“It’s insulting to ascert over and over again that parents don’t know what’s going on and should be mad,” said Andersen. “Parents who are involved in their school’s education know what Second Step is. They know what’s going on in their kid’s elementary classroom. And if they have problems with it, they’re bringing it to us. They don’t need you to sit up here once a month and tell them they need to get mad at things because they’re engaged in their kid’s education, every day, 365 days a year.”
Later in the meeting, school board vice chair Kellie Lockerby spoke on the Second Step argument.
“What I have found on the Second Step website, it’s that anti-racism and anti-bias are recommended additions, but it’s not part of the Second Step curriculum,” said Lockerby.
Lord continued the mental health presentation, discussing ways that Gloucester High School supports student mental health and development. GHS covers difficult topics such as healthy, unhealthy and abusive relationships and drug awareness. The school also provides books on mental health issues in the library and tries to make GHS a place where students want to be by creating a positive environment.
GHS also recognizes students through certificates for special achievements and public recognition, such as the student of the month award. “Students notice stuff like that,” said Lord.
Bagent also spoke on student mental health during his last meeting as Student Advisory Council representative.
“Please don’t allow the issue of student mental health be set aside once again,” said Bagent. “Note that tonight’s discussion about mental health turned into an argument about Critical Race Theory, rather than actually discussing mental health for the elementary level.”
“Mr. Bagent, I just wanted to apologize on behalf of the board that the mental health presentation was hijacked by a discussion on Critical Race Theory,” said Rice. “Our guidance department does do extremely well in trying to take care of our students and take care of their mental health, and it was unfortunate that that happened.”