Tomorrow (Saturday) is World Mental Health Day. During the current climate, where we are all trying to adapt to this new way of living, Mrs Schembri, our Mental Health Co-Ordinator, reminds us of the support available. 

“As this weekend celebrates World Mental Health Day, I thought that I would remind you about the support that is available to your children, and to you, in School. I am one of the School Nurses and I also work as the Mental Health Co-ordinator based in the Chat Room in Lambe’s. Pupils can come to see me if they need to talk to someone about how they are feeling. This could be for any number of reasons including feeling anxious, worried, having a low mood, maybe confused, having difficulties with friendships or home life. 

The service we provide is confidential unless we feel it is necessary to bring in extra resources. If I feel that more help is needed, there are other members of the pastoral team that I can refer to, for example, our School Counsellor, Sally Cloke, our Chaplain, Mr Davies, our Designated Safeguarding Lead, Mrs Rose or the Behaviour Therapist, Jo Head. When necessary, referrals are made to organisations outside of School for more specialised help. Throughout this process, we work with parents as much as possible.

Our children’s mental health and wellbeing are important to us all and something that we take very seriously at SVS. The link below to the NHS Every Mind Matters page provides some great information about how to support your child’s mental health.  

https://www.nhs.uk/oneyou/every-mind-matters/childrens-mental-health/

Our Pupil Mental Health and Wellbeing website pages also have lots of useful information – http://www.svs.org.uk/MentalHealthSupport

I hope that you find them useful. You can also email needtotalk@svs.org.uk to reach out for support.”

Louise Schembri