Mental health struggles have been on a rise ever since 2020, and students are being greatly affected. Their academic performance is decreasing, proving this right.

After returning to school in August 2021, mental health has been at its most negative peak ever shown. Professionals are saying that the COVID-19 pandemic has a big impact on this, according to Kid’s Mental Health is in Crisis. Students are suffering mainly from anxiety and depression which is why their academics are declining.

Counselor-in-training, Diego Gonzalez, says that decreasing academics can be a key factor in showing that students are dealing with mental health struggles.

“For example, a student who does pretty well: they’re getting A’s and B’s, and just out of nowhere, they start getting C’s and D’s. That could be like a huge indicator too,” Gonzalez said.

Schools’ staff have been seeing student’s academics take a dip during these past school years. About 84% of them said that student stress has increased greatly according to The State of Student Mental Health Survey, conducted by ECINS, a student support and case management system.

Bianca Suarez, FACE liaison, says that as she works with parents, she sees a lack of understanding when it comes to mental health.

“I think parents should have more knowledge about how mental health works and the effects in students,” she said.

Parents seem to not believe or pay much attention to when their child mentions anything about mental health or any struggles that have to do with academics.

MCHS counselor Janet Montes mentions that students can simply not have the right support to face their mental health struggles, making it very difficult in certain situations.

“But a student is very much affected in achieving their goals if they don’t have support for their mental health services,” she said.

About 88% of students say they wish their schools had more resources for mental health challenges according to Student Mental Health in Decline.

Montes also mentions that a student’s mental health can be affected very easily due to having to work with so many tasks or even new experiences in high school and having so little control over them.

“Honestly, it can be anything, particularly at your guys’ age, because you have so little control of everything all the time,” Montes said

According to Recognizing Mental Health Problems In Children, children’s mental health challenges are prone to be overlooked and often make the student fall into bad habits if not treated correctly or in a certain time period.

“Mental health is like a scar, it goes away for a bit but it’s always with you,” Suarez said.

Mental Health Resources:
https://www.teenline.org/youth
https://www.westernyouthservices.org/services-overview/
https://www.ochealthinfo.com/services-programs/mental-health-crisis-recovery/mental-health
https://www.caloptima.org/en/ForProviders/BehavioralHealth/BehavioralHealthResources
https://didihirsch.org/