Strengthening Mental Health Support for Children & Adolescents in Greater Lowell
By Kathy Register
Lowell, Mass. – Responding to a growing awareness of how the pandemic has impacted the mental and emotional health of children and adolescents, the Greater Lowell Community Foundation (GLCF) awarded grants to help three nonprofits improve mental-health services for local youth. With the grant funding, each organization addressed the need with a unique approach.
ThinkGive was able to teach crucial social and emotional learning skills to more under-resourced children and adolescents. The International Institute of New England (IINE) strengthened the mental-health support it offers teen-aged refugees. And Adolescent Consultation Services (ACS) expanded the mental-health services it provides directly to court-involved children in Greater Lowell. All three nonprofits have noticed an increased need for their services since COVID-19 hit.
“The pandemic really put social and emotional learning (SEL) on people’s radar,” said ThinkGive Executive Director Penny Austen. “Social and emotional learning is how kids acquire the skills to develop a healthy identity, manage their emotions, maintain relationships, and make responsible decisions. It’s a fundamental layer of child development,” she explained.
“Before COVID, many considered SEL a soft skill. Now, with the youth mental-health crises we’re seeing as a result of the pandemic, the importance of social and emotional learning is magnified,” said Austen.
“Greater Lowell Community Foundation is proud to support these three local partners who are focusing their services on the mental health of our youngest friends and neighbors,” said GLCF President & CEO Jay Linnehan. “At the end of 2022, we were able to support seven nonprofits in Greater Lowell that were addressing mental-health needs, and we are now seeing some encouraging results from this funding.”
ThinkGive, a 10-year-old nonprofit based in Concord, has developed a curriculum for teaching social and emotional learning (SEL) to children in grades K-8, Austen explained. The free curriculum is taught in public and private schools, and after-school and weekend programs in Acton, Billerica, Carlisle, Chelmsford, Concord and Lowell.
“Knowing how to form and maintain healthy relationships with others is key,” she said. “And SEL skills carry on through our entire lives – through high school, college, in the workplace, and into our family lives.”
Thanks to the GLCF grant, ThinkGive was able to expand its reach by working with educators to implement its research-based curriculum in five new schools and organizations, engaging 360 under-resourced youth.
The International Institute of New England (IINE), a regional refugee resettlement agency, applied for a GLCF grant in 2022 after resettling 236 Afghan evacuees in Lowell, according to Caroline Hanson Rowe, Lowell Managing Director.
“Among this group, we were aware of individuals suffering from PTSD, many had missing family members back in Afghanistan, some arrived without their parents,” she said. “Foremost in our minds was the fact that all these special circumstances can be especially traumatic for young people.”
When IINE began having trouble partnering clients with local mental-health providers – there were not enough providers to meet the need, thanks in part to the pandemic – Rowe and her staff began exploring ways to build community to support the young refugees.
“We set about creating places where this cohort – most were ages 15 to 25 – could go for support,” she said. IINE initially focused on organizing group physical activities.
Staff started giving yoga classes, which were a big hit, according to Rowe. They also offered soccer clinics, and even started a swimming program for young women and girls, which was wildly successful.
“We partnered with the Merrimack College women’s swim team,” explained Rowe, herself a former college swimmer. “And we focused on our female Afghan clients – many had not even been swimming before. We arranged a ‘closed’ pool: covered windows, all-female lifeguards. It was a female-only environment.”
IINE also held training sessions and workshops for parents and teens on relaxation and how to de-stress, on health and hygiene, career planning, and domestic violence (for the young women).
More than a year later, things are looking up, said Rowe. “We now have a strong youth community and it’s growing. Our groups don’t fit into the spaces they used to.”
Adolescent Consultation Services (ACS) and its staff of licensed social workers, mental-health counselors, and psychologists, provide diagnostic evaluations and direct mental-health services for juveniles involved with Middlesex County courts, according to Robyn Eastwood, Director of Development.
“When a child appears in front of a judge – often it’s for not going to school – the judge can order diagnostic evaluations. We interview children, families, schools, etc. and write up a report for the judge,” she explained.
Founded in 1973, ACS mainly serves youth ages 12 to 18. Over the years, the nonprofit has expanded its services. “We have been branching out to provide more treatment services, such as individual and group therapy,” said Eastwood.
“The need is so great and there are not enough mental-health providers. Sometimes we see kids who need specific types of services and the wait to receive them can be up to a year. But we can start therapy right away in most cases. And our services are free,” she said.
“Our goal is to support and empower court-involved children by providing mental-health services. We want to help kids envision and work toward a better future.”
Through its GLCF grant, ACS worked closely with Lowell Juvenile Court and was able to provide services to more than 90 court-involved youth in Greater Lowell in FY2023. And Eastwood agrees the pandemic is affecting their clients.
“It’s still unfolding, but the pandemic contributes to just about every case, in some way. The acuity of cases has increased, and it has affected the whole family,” she added. “Thankfully, this GLCF grant allowed ACS to increase our private treatment program.”
“Funding for this critical need became a priority for the foundation when we heard from so many of our nonprofit partners about how months of social isolation and prolonged lack of in-school instruction set many kids back at crucial times in their emotional and mental development,” explained Jennifer Aradhya, GLCF’s Vice President of Marketing, Programs & Strategy. “We continue to look at this need for future funding opportunities.”
For further information about the Greater Lowell Community Foundation and its grant-funding opportunities, visit: www.glcfoundation.org
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TOP PHOTO CAPTION: Greater Lowell Community Foundation awarded grants to help three nonprofits improve mental-health services for local youth, including International Institute of New England (IINE) which provided programs to teen and young adult females that focused on organizing group physical activities including yoga classes.
BOTTOM PHOTO CAPTION: Greater Lowell Community Foundation awarded grants to help three nonprofits improve mental-health services for local youth, including ThinkGive that provided social and emotional learning (SEL) after-school and weekend programs in Acton, Billerica, Carlisle, Chelmsford, Concord and Lowell.
