Nearly $3 million mental health service grant awarded to MSU’s CoEHS

MURRAY, Ky. – Murray State University’s College of Education and Human Services is pleased to announce that Partner and Connect: MSU/WKEC Mental Health Providers Academy, a nearly $3 million, five-year, Mental Health Service Partnership Demonstration grant from the Department of Education, has been awarded to West Kentucky Educational Cooperative (WKEC) on behalf of 14 high-need school districts, as well as Murray State’s College of Education and Human Services.

Gretchen Wetzel, WKEC’s executive director, explained that the academy will train and credential 24 diverse school counselors/mental health providers and six diverse community school psychologists in a graduate program designed to place mental health providers in high-need school districts to reduce the counselor-to-student ratio in rural and low-income schools.

The high-need school districts being served are as follows: Ballard County, Caldwell County, Carlisle County, Christian County, Crittenden County, Dawson Springs Independent, Fulton County, Fulton Independent, Hickman County, Livingston County, Lyon County, Mayfield Independent, Paducah Public Schools and Union County.

The program’s absolute priority is to “expand the capacity” of school-based mental health providers in the aforementioned high-need districts. It will do so by implementing an innovative partnership that allows not only for recruitment, but for placement of “diverse, inclusive and community graduate Master of Arts in Education School Counseling, School Mental Health Worker and/or School Psychologist candidates into the academy for the purpose of ‘completing the required training necessary to complete their degree or obtain a credential as a school-based mental health services provider.’”

Candidates in the academy will have the ongoing opportunity to receive guidance, support, mentoring and additional training from the Partner and Connect Coordinator. In addition, WKEC will provide evidence-based mental health training opportunities in areas such as threat assessment, trauma informed care and suicide prevention to strengthen candidates during classes, practicum and internships in order to best meet the needs of their students.

The College of Education and Human Services is grateful for this generous grant, which provides the opportunity to best serve the west Kentucky community’s mental health needs.

For more information on Murray State University's College of Education and Human Services, please visit murraystate.edu/COEHS.