Scholarship offered for mental health program

A local mental health council is offering assistance to get someone to help with mental health training in the area.

The Hill County Health Consortium’s Mental Health Local Advisory Council is offering a scholarship valued at about $5,000 to send someone to a week-long training program in Phoenix to become a certified instructor in Mental Health First Aid and is asking for application letters by Friday.

Amber Spring of Center for Mental Health, the chair of the council, said once a person becomes a certified instructor, they can provide training to groups or organizations such as law enforcement, schools, detention centers and anyone who wants to raise the understanding about mental health issues of their staff members.

In the Mental Health First Aid programs, “everybody is training on what the signs and symptoms of mental illness are, how to help a person, looking for suicide risks, those kinds of things,” Spring said.

The training is recommended for people who are interested in bringing the community together in helping people with mental illnesses, reducing negative attitudes about mental illnesses, showing people how they can help and building mental health literacy in Hill County, a press release about the scholarship said.

Any interested person is invited to apply for the scholarship, included community members in general, educators and school administrators, social workers, counselors, medical providers, family support workers, law enforcement officers, members of faith communities, substance abuse treatment professionals, people suffering from mental illnesses or their family members.

The five-day course, which will be held in Phoenix Nov. 3-7, includes:

• Teaching the Mental Health First Aid course including its five-step action plan, evidence-supported treatment and data on the prevalence of mental illnesses;

• How to present the program;

• Applying the program to different kinds of groups with different learning styles. and

• Tailoring the presentation to different kinds of groups in different environments.

Students taking the five-day course will be evaluated through a written test and an evaluated presentation. More information is available at http://www.mentalhealthfirstaid.org/cs/become-an-instructor.

The Local Advisory Council is requiring applicants to commit to offering at least three training courses in Hill County each year for at least three years, follow the procedures of Mental Health First Aid to maintain their certification and sign a letter of commitment to participate as an active member of the council.

Candidates are asked to submit a letter of interest and a resume by 5 p.m. Friday, including their:

• Contact information,

• Motivation for becoming a certified instructor,

• Experience or skills that are relevant to providing the eight-hour course once certified,

• Thoughts on how they could or would promote Mental Health First Aid including relevant information from a business plan, organizational support, or other elements showing how they would work to provide long-term sustainability and develop the program,

• How they would work with other certified instructors or how they might serve differently, and

• The factors they believe create and maintain unfavorable attitudes some people have toward people with mental health problems.

The person selected for the scholarship must then complete and submit a packet with the application for the course available on the Mental Health First Aid website.

Spring said having more people trained to recognize mental illnesses and help people suffering from illness will benefit the community in many ways. She said people hear about horrific events where the perpetrators might have some kind of mental health problems, but many may not realize how common the problem is. One in four people will experience some kind of mental health issue in their lifetime.

“It’s their co-workers and family members,” Spring said. “Mental illness is very treatable, I think is the other thing (many) people don’t recognize. Sometimes, maybe all it would take is somebody speaking to them, to ask them, ‘Have you thought about speaking to your provider or going to talk to somebody,’ to help them, whether it’s grief or depression or all kinds of different issues.”

People can submit their letters of interest to Spring at the Center For Mental Health at 313 3rd St. in Havre or by mail at PO Box 1658, Havre, MT 59501 or via email to [email protected]. The selection committee will review the letters and make a decision next Monday.

For more information, people can call Spring at 265-9639.