Background

To support student mental health, school staff must have knowledge of evidence-based practices and the capacity to implement them. One approach used to address this challenge is a group-based telementoring model called Extension for Community Healthcare Outcomes (ECHO). In other applications (e.g., healthcare settings), ECHO has been shown to increase healthcare professionals’ self-efficacy and knowledge of evidence-based practices leading to improved patient outcomes.

Objectives

This study examined the potential for ECHO to be used as a method for increasing school staff engagement and knowledge of evidence-based school mental health practices.

Methods

Using a quasi-experimental design, this study compared outcomes across two professional development experiences aimed at promoting school staff ability to provide evidence-based mental health services. School staff from four school districts participated in a school mental health training initiative. All participants (N = 57) had access to asynchronous, online mental health modules. A sub-sample (n = 33) was also offered monthly ECHO sessions.

Results

Tests of group difference in outcomes revealed significant increases in engagement with online learning (d = 0.58) and satisfaction (d = 0.82) for those who participated in ECHO as compared to those who did not. Knowledge about evidence-based practices was not significantly different between groups.

Conclusions

Results suggest that group-based telementoring may be a promising approach for improving engagement and satisfaction with training initiatives aimed at promoting evidence-based school mental health practices. However, further study of ProjectECHO using experimental designs is needed to make causal inferences about its effect on provider outcomes.

中文翻译：

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支持学校心理健康提供者：来自短期远程辅导模型的证据

背景

为了支持学生的心理健康，学校工作人员必须具备循证实践知识和实施这些实践的能力。用于应对这一挑战的一种方法是基于群体的远程指导模型，称为社区医疗保健结果扩展(ECHO)。在其他应用中（例如，医疗保健环境），ECHO 已被证明可以提高医疗保健专业人员的自我效能和循证实践知识，从而改善患者的治疗效果。

目标

本研究检验了 ECHO 被用作增加学校教职工参与度和循证学校心理健康实践知识的方法的潜力。

方法

本研究使用准实验设计，比较了两种旨在提高学校教职工提供循证心理健康服务能力的专业发展经历的结果。来自四个学区的学校工作人员参加了学校心理健康培训计划。所有参与者 ( N  = 57) 都可以访问异步的在线心理健康模块。 每月还提供一个子样本（n = 33）ECHO 会议。

结果

结果的组差异测试显示，与 未参加 ECHO 的人相比，参加 ECHO 的人参与在线学习 ( d  = 0.58) 和满意度 ( d = 0.82) 显着增加。各组之间关于循证实践的知识没有显着差异。

结论

结果表明，以小组为基础的远程辅导可能是一种很有前途的方法，可以提高对旨在促进循证学校心理健康实践的培训计划的参与度和满意度。然而，需要使用实验设计对 ProjectECHO 进行进一步研究，以对其对提供者结果的影响进行因果推断。