Join Lindsey and Misty Bonta, Ed.S and Lead Mental Health Clinician at High Tech High for an inspiring and motivating SPEDtalk session. Learn how Misty made her dream of helping others into a reality. Her school wellness centers provide mental health support to hundreds of students, parents and teachers. Misty provides invaluable insights for those who wish to create a program that can truly make a difference. See how Misty’s focus on humility and collaboration with others has made her into a hero worth emulating.
Lindsey:
Good morning, Facebook! how’s everybody doing today? I am so excited to be here with you. Welcome to SPEDtalk. I’m your host, Lindsey Kucich, lead mental health therapist here at Global Teletherapy, and thank you so much for joining today’s show.
Lindsey:
We have a really unique topic today to discuss, so I think you’re all going to like it. But first, I want to know who’s watching. Make a comment, let me know where you’re watching from, and of course, ask questions throughout the show, because we want to hear from you.
Lindsey:
Thank you Elana for joining us. Olivia, Janet, all my favorite people that are coming through, and I’m trying to not have my sound go through so I can watch what’s happening. Technology problems, but that’s okay. All right.
Lindsey:
Before we get started, take a minute right now and share this video, so that we can reach as many viewers as possible. I love that our fan base is growing, were doing an excellent job, and always to my fans that couldn’t watch live, just comment hashtag #TeamReplay. If you miss any of our awesome shows, you can always find them on Global Teletherapy’s YouTube channel or Facebook page. You can also follow us on Instagram and LinkedIn, just search for Global Teletherapy.
Lindsey:
Are you guys ready for today’s show? Because I am super excited.
Lindsey:
A fellow licensed educational psychologist out in California, Misty Bonta, has over 12 years of experience working in various educational environments. She has served as a teacher, administrator, and school psychologist. Misty has extensive experience in elementary, middle, and high school settings. She is an expert working with children who have severe emotional, behavioral, social, and academic needs. By building and maintaining strong collaborative relationships with all staff, teachers, students, and families, she has been able to help so many people.
Lindsey:
Misty is a proven leader with a demonstrated ability to be a change agent for students, schools, districts, and in the field of school psychology. Today, she is joining to discuss her work, creating wellness centers. Everybody welcome Misty to the show. Thank you so much, Misty, for joining us. How are you doing today?
Misty:
I’m doing fabulous. How are you?
Lindsey:
Wonderful! I am so excited to have you here, so you can talk to us about this very, very unique system that you have put together. So first, what exactly is a wellness center, and who is it designed for?
Lindsey:
Wellness center, really it was created in a way to have mental health services for all students, not just our students with IEP’s or 504s. It was really a way to re-imagine like a counseling center to be a more holistic approach for kids to come and make appointments, and get … Not only just to be able to talk to someone, but actually practice tools, get resources, and feel more like a coaching type of center for students. It’s again, for all students, and we’ve collaborated with outside agencies as well to bring in resources not only for mental health, but physical health as well.
Lindsey:
No, that’s fantastic, and right now in the current state of the country, we know mental health is the new buzz word topic. Everybody is trying to figure out what are we going to do with these students come the beginning of the year, right? A wellness center is definitely a place to start.
Lindsey:
Now, it probably can’t be easy gathering resources or figuring out even what resources to offer. So what types of resources do you currently offer?
Misty:
Kind of backing up, the appointments are made by students. This was done at a high school, couple of high schools, and they’re 30-minute appointments. The resources that we started with was actually asking the students what they needed. And so based on what they felt like they needed help with is how we started our topics. Stress management was a very hot topic, and so we built in tools or resources around stress management.
Lindsey:
That sounds like a great idea. You have to do a needs assessment, right? If you’re setting this up in low-SES or high-SES, you’re going to have a different need for that population. I really like the idea of asking the student. This is for the students.
Misty:
It’s for the students, yes.
Lindsey:
Sometimes we forget about that. We should ask the students, so that’s a really good point to bring about. That’s a great resource to start with, that stress management. What other resources do you have?
Misty:
Dating was a hot topic or just relationships in general. Communication skills as well was a hot topic. And I guess not only with friends, but dating and parents came up a lot. Sometimes we did bring in parents, if the student felt comfortable with that, for communication.
Misty:
Specific people that we brought in was regarding eating. We had a lot of students that had eating challenges or eating disorders. So we partnered with an outside agency to come and talk to our students about that, and offer resources that we have in the wellness center.
Misty:
The Mindfulness Institute was another one that we partnered with to bring in mindfulness tools, the biofeedback machine we have. We have also partnered with what we have here in San Diego, San Diego Youth Services for suicide prevention, but also they give us some tools around vaping, substance abuse, things that we can have in the wellness center, just psycho-education around some of those topics. Yeah.
Lindsey:
Those are really good. I love how you’re pooling resources from the community. It sounds like a wide range of expertise to help all these students on the campus, so I think that’s fantastic.
Lindsey:
A lot of times when we bring in outside resources, or we put something on our campuses, we definitely need the support of the district and administration. How did you work with your administration to create the center? I can’t even imagine the questions they would have about budgeting, and, “Well, then how is this going to work, and who’s involved?”
Lindsey:
How did you prepare to have that conversation with your administration, and what kind of answers did you provide for them?
Misty:
I’ve been with the current organization for three years, and it was the first year that they actually had school psychologists on campus at all, and there’s no school counselors or any other mental health professional. They were pretty hesitant with even that piece. They felt like teachers really are equipped to provide social, emotional support to students. It’s been an uphill challenge to even get anything on campus.
Misty:
Starting with school psychologists my first year, the whole reason maybe this also started was, I used to just get Post-it notes with kids’ names all over my desk when I came back from lunch, and it would just say a kid’s name with anxiety by it. I just was like, “What is this?” Obviously there was a need, yeah.
Lindsey:
I’m sure, speaking as a school psychologist, I’m glad to know … All of our school psychologists out there watching, I want you to put in a comment, what is the craziest way that you got a referral to go see a student? I love this random Post-it note, but it happened.
Misty:
Right.
Lindsey:
So clearly there is a need, and I really feel the administration isn’t always aware of that need, especially if this is the avenue that they’re going through. It’s not an SST process-
Misty:
Exactly.
Lindsey:
There’s no formal referral. So I think just identifying that component, and expressing that to administration, and be like, “Your teachers are asking for help and we need to have something that’s more structured,” would be a really great conversation to have at first.
Misty:
I took of the first year with those Post-It notes, and tracked just how much there was a need, right? And so at the end of that year, that was what I’d brought to administration to say. “Look, there’s a need. There’s only so much I can do. What are some things that we can do to kind of support this need that we have?”
Lindsey:
No, that’s fantastic. Showing them the data, right? That is what at school sites we are great at. We will collect that data, and as long as we know how to use it, that works to our advantage. Excellent.
Lindsey:
Okay, so now that we’ve established there’s a need, what other things can we do to help administration understand the reasoning, why this is so important?
Misty:
I felt like for my administration, I definitely had to build trust and a relationship with them to even see. They saw the data, but they did to see the need themselves.
Misty:
Some of the students that I was working with, I had them also meet with the administration. We have a smaller school, so it’s about 500 students, so they were able to do that. Just to kind of get some of the concerns that also the students are hearing. So I had buy-in from some of the students that also felt like we needed more support, and that was really where the change happened at my current school, because they really value student voice.
Misty:
And so that was where, again, the pool … They had a group of students, I had created a group of students to go talk to administration.
Lindsey:
That’s fantastic. So making sure that what you’re doing is working is also really key. So what kind of benefits did you start seeing once you started implementing some of these resources?
Misty:
I think one of the coolest things that we started to see was students bringing other students to the wellness center, and maybe students that shared that they never talked to anyone in their whole life. They had something that they needed to get off their chest, they’ve never shared.
Misty:
Sometimes you would see friends bringing their friends, crying, or kind of, “It’s okay. They’re cool. They’re all right.” Because we made it very chill and not like a therapy … It wasn’t really framed as therapy, although it is. It was very much like a wellness center, and much more chill and relaxed to encourage students to come. I think also that we had some visitors that came often. So we had return visitors, and at every visit we did ask for feedback from students.
Misty:
So we did take some of their feedback each time, things that we could do better. For example, we started at 20-minute appointments. We heard from students, “We would like a little bit longer.” So we changed them to 30-minute appointments. They asked for snacks and drinks, so things like that they asked.
Misty:
Like I said, we also took feedback from specific tools. So not only that initial needs assessment, ongoing through each appointment, what were the trends or things that the students were asking for that they wanted to learn more about? Which kind of entailed then the wellness center became a wellness program. And so part of that wellness program was doing more PD maybe with students, or having students engage in the work with us and do the PD on the topics that they were asking for more help.
Lindsey:
No, that’s great. Just get that involvement, and I’m sure it has to just grow organically. You can’t just drop in a brand new building, and now it’s open. It does need to take that slower approach where the kids bring each other, because once they’ve established a trust, then it can spread and they can share that wisdom.
Lindsey:
And I really liked the idea of engaging the students in that professional development to really have them become teachers to help and coach their peers. I know there’s a lot of programs out there, like a [Links Program and Buddies & Pals, and all those different programs to really teach that peer support. So incorporating peer support programs in the wellness center, sounds like that should be really impactful as well.
Misty:
Yep, and our goal is to make wellness ambassadors. So basically, certain students that are also kind of trained to help some of our other students, kind of like those programs.
Lindsey:
That’s wonderful! So what kind of positive feedback did you get from both the staff? More like the teachers and the administration, because those testimonies really can help other school psychologists bring this to their school site. So what kind of feedback did you hear from them about the benefits?
Misty:
I should also say that the wellness center was open to teachers, parents, and staff. We didn’t start that way, but it grew into that. So I mean, teachers were thankful. They learn things within their own appointment to also bring back to students.
Misty:
I guess that the biggest positive feedback is that there’s 16 schools in our organization, and because of this one school that I started this program at, they want it at every school. So next year and going forth, they want to have something like that at all the schools.
Misty:
So the buy-in from, “We don’t want any mental health on campuses,” to three years later, “Yes, we want it for all 16 schools,” is I guess the proof that they feel that it’s necessary, they feel like it’s helpful.
Lindsey:
That’s amazing. That’s huge growth.
Misty:
Huge, huge.
Lindsey:
Fabulous school psychologist is watching right now, Mary Beth out in Texas. Thank you for joining us, and she definitely loves the idea that students get to have input in the program. So I love that component of it.
Lindsey:
And I love that you say this is open to teachers, because how many times do you as school psychs think that we should have office hours just for teachers? And you want to help when the teachers just come to your door and they just kind of unload. So how did that … Well, now I’m super curious. Now that it’s allowed and it’s structured as part of the wellness center, tell me more about how this teacher engagement worked. Like did they come at recess or on their lunch break? Before school, after school? They abandoned their kids during the class? I mean…
Misty:
Well, this happened during the teachers’ lunches, so they would come during their lunch, if they would like to make an appointment. And it was really, again, a way to streamline that need, because it was already occurring, right? Just to your point. Teachers do come, and often you might not be really prepared for that, or maybe you’re doing something else. That was honestly kind of a way for us to make it available to teachers, that all teachers know that it’s available to them, and to make it more structured for us.
Misty:
And actually have the availability in staff, because I did bring in other people to help me with this work. I wasn’t alone in providing all the mental health or all the kids. I had an intern and I had a partner, somebody that … An associate that was working on their LPCC that was helping as well.
Lindsey:
Yeah, that’s fantastic. You definitely need more bodies. You cannot handle, even though your campus was what? 500 students?
Misty:
500 students. I have multiple schools right now. It started at one school, I only had the capacity to kind of focus on one school and really make it right at that one school, and now like I said, it’s spreading.
Lindsey:
Absolutely, and it sounds like it’s growing. And so I think that’s a really key point to know, is that it’s okay to start small. And so that means we have to talk about first steps and creating that.
Lindsey:
So what would you recommend be the first step for any other mental health professional to take on this desire to create a wellness center at their site? What would be your number one recommendation to have them slowly ease into this?
Misty:
I think the very first thing was just assessing the need, if it’s something right for their school and their environment. And the conversations with administration didn’t just happen all at once, right? It was kind of ongoing, so keeping them in the loop as to … Like I said, that year of data was really … Yes, I shared it at the end of the year, but I showed it throughout the year and kind of had that open dialogue.
Misty:
I think the most important step is just building that trusting relationship with them, and allowing them to see the value that you give, as well as other mental health professionals could give. Yeah, I think that’s the very first … The very first step is a big relationship with your administration, because if you don’t have that, you’re not going to be able to get the buy-in, and then being able to show the need would be the next step. Yeah.
Lindsey:
Yeah, and as mental professionals, we always know that there’s a need. We’re never going to say that there’s not. There’s a need! We need to convince others what that need is and what it looks like. And like you said, it does look different at different levels. Elementary students are going to have a much different need than our high school students. So I think that’s really important too.
Lindsey:
I also want to circle back around to that mention of parents, and parents getting access to these resources. So how is that structured? Is it just during the school day? Were there nighttime programs available? How did that work for them?
Misty:
They were after school, it was only one day a week. There was just a couple appointments, and they didn’t honestly get as many as we would’ve liked, but yeah. It’s actually been way easier since quarantine, to be honest, to run all of this in some ways, because the wellness centers were remained open, just in a virtual space.
Misty:
Yeah, we also did the one-on-one appointments with parents, as well as a parent support group, which was going to turn into more of a parent PD as well. So sometimes it was just hearing them out, sometimes it was kind of introducing some sort of tip or tool for the parents. So that was kind of the parent piece, so far.
Lindsey:
That’s excellent. Schools are doing it. [crosstalk 00:19:20] … You brought up a question that I had. Well, since this is campus base, it’s at the school site, I was curious to see … Well, what happened during this quarantine and with COVID-19 happening? Did the wellness center close? Did it stay open? So it sounds like it stayed open. Can you talk a little bit more about how you continued to service the parents and the students during this time? Because I think that’s so critical for a lot of students who are feeling isolated.
Misty:
For sure. I had my students that I had to see through their IEP services as well, but other than that, I had a Calendarly link, which was open to staff, parents and students, and it has my availability all set in. So instead of having a specific day for the wellness center, it was Monday through Friday, just kind of based on my availability.
Misty:
We also, in addition to that, had Mindfulness Mondays for educators, so it was a group just for the teachers. And then on Tuesdays, we had a student wellness group for students, and then on Thursdays was the parent wellness group for parents. I utilized our mental health interns that we have that also provide services also on the calls. So I co-ran it with them, so it wasn’t all alone. I’m doing all this together.
Misty:
The wellness check-ins, again, they just used the link, but they were 30 minutes. Similar set up, where you check in, you kind of see what’s going on, provide some tools and resources, and then see if there’s any follow up that’s needed.
Lindsey:
Wow, that sounds like a very organized procedure, and you did it so fast to transition this into an online virtual setting. So do you think that you’re going to have lasting results using the virtual tools that you implemented when you go back to the traditional setting? Will you keep the option of having online services in tandem with the in-person services?
Misty:
For parents? For sure. It was so much easier for parents to access those resources I think, instead of having to leave work. So now rethinking it, I think we would have had more appointments with parents if we would have allowed maybe for Zoom or some virtual spaces.
Misty:
I also love the PD in the virtual space. I think that the parents, sometimes maybe we got more to come, just because they didn’t always have to show their camera or participate, but just being able to be in the PT. Also, we had definitely parents that came every week to our parent wellness club, and felt like at the end like, “Thank you. Thank you for this space. Thank you for allowing me to have …”
Misty:
Really, the parent wellness group was for parents to have a space that was free from talking about parenting, to be honest. We didn’t in that space talk about parenting. It was like self-care for parents, or just a place to vent and like get support for one another. It was beautiful. So they kind of helped each other through that space. So that was separate than like a parenting PD, where it was actually more talking about skills, which could be a little bit more stressful in some ways. So I wanted to have both of those spaces for the parents.
Misty:
To your question, yes. I think Zoom will be used.
Lindsey:
So now that it’s growing and you’re changing, and morphing and adapting, honestly, this is a positive thing that came out of COVID-19. We always talk about the negatives, so I really feel like we really need to focus on the positive, that this forced us to change and take advantage of technologies, and that way we really can reach more people. Your wellness center is a prime example of how it’s going to have positive lasting effects.
Lindsey:
So that kind of goes into your vision probably has changed. So what’s the larger vision, or what’s your next steps for the wellness center? And how do you want to continue to grow?
Misty:
So like I shared, that the other schools are more interested. I’m taking a new role in the organization as a lead mental health clinician for all 16 schools. That work will continue on to grow.
Misty:
The school psychologists that we have on our campuses are fantastic, and some of these ideas I got from them. So I want to give them credit as well, it hasn’t just been all me. It’s definitely requires buy-in from multiple people and like go-to people that you can have.
Misty:
So going forward, I definitely want to partner more with our community agencies and again, bring in like a monthly special, basically. Like a hot topic for each month, and provide it to parents, teachers and students. So maybe grief when we come back, or trauma, or autism, or whatever the kind of monthly special topic is.
Misty:
I would love to continue to have students be able to check in, and staff and parents, but even more than that, I would love for agency to be made with our students. So them to be able to do the PD themselves, like our older students to our younger students.
Misty:
And especially during this time, maybe they can share how they’re coping through quarantine, or through the civil unrest we’re going through, or whatever those topics are, right? That our students are … All kids are extraordinary, but we definitely have some leaders in our bunch, that I feel like I want to capitalize on their leadership skills and provide that to our younger kids.
Lindsey:
Absolutely. Giving the leaders an opportunity to have a voice, to share their knowledge to others, and speak the language that may be us adults don’t necessarily speak, and they could reach a larger group of students. That sounds like a wonderful vision and plan.
Misty:
And I’d love for the students to do it for parents as well, so that the parents can hear from the students’ perspective some of these more sensitive topics.
Lindsey:
Everyone educating everyone I think is definitely a great model to use.
Lindsey:
So tell us a little bit about what the wellness center has meant to you and your own self care? Because when you are responsible for this large, large project that really is promoting wellness, and mental health and self-care, we have to take care of ourselves too. So what kind of strategies or tips, or what has it all meant to you in the end?
Misty:
So I’ve been doing this work like you mentioned for 12 years, and the first five years, I was just very overworked in a very small district, and worked with really, really … Kids and really challenging cases, kids in juvenile hall and these kinds of things, and I got myself burnt out for sure. And so I did not do self-care. I did unhealthy ways of self-care, right.
Misty:
And so I think that life change kind of started the work, and what I’ve been doing … You know, I started to work out more regularly, I wake up early to do that, which was hard for me to do, but building good habits. I journal every day, I engage in my own mindfulness techniques, and I communicate more, I ask for more help.
Misty:
And I think I joined CASP and other organizations. I became on the board of the San CASP, which is our local school psychology organization in San Diego. Those kind of changed the whole game for me, to have connection and to not feel so alone in this work. It was huge. And then beyond that, to create anything hasn’t been just me. It’s been talking to the other people, and getting their ideas and their tools, and going, “Oh, what have I learned? What can I learn from them, and take and help my community?” Because it will look different for every school and for everybody. And humbling myself and letting ego go, and stop comparing myself to other people, because it’s not helpful.
Misty:
All of those things. So listening more too, as well. Just being able to … Yeah.
Lindsey:
Those are great, and it does force us to grow as professionals and individuals as we start helping more people. And of course we know that we have to take care of ourselves, because we cannot pour from an empty cup. It really sounds like you’ve found that balance to really make the best impact for everyone around you. So thank you so much for sharing all of these resources.
Lindsey:
And I know everyone’s wondering like, “Where do I find more information? I need this.” So I will let everybody know, Misty has this amazing wellness website. I’m going to put that in the comments after the show and you’ll have access, and Misty’s also created a Facebook group. So do you want to tell them the name of the Facebook group, and a little bit about that too?
Misty:
It’s called the Life and Times of a School Psychologist, and I created it right after that burnout. So it was a way for me to connect, and it was just me for maybe a couple of years, me and like three other friends. No, maybe 10 of us that worked in the district. Now we have about 4,500 school psychologists in the group, and we have a file section, which is fabulous, with tests, templates or resources on emotional disturbance or autism, whatever you would like, therapy resources.
Misty:
So join if you … Yeah, we’d love to have you.
Lindsey:
Absolutely! Resources for school sites in that collaboration piece, so I’ll make sure that we put a link in the comments section as well to your Facebook group. And if you’re a school psychologist, please feel free to join that group as well.
Lindsey:
So Misty, thank you so much for joining us today. I really appreciate you taking the time and sharing this amazing transformation that you did with your campus, and how it really can help it impact everyone else. So anyone else that’s watching that wants to take on this endeavor, more power to them, and we’ll make sure that they have the resources to do so.
Misty:
Yes, yes. Thank you so much, Lindsey. It’s been a pleasure.
Lindsey:
Have a wonderful day.
Misty:
Yeah, see you.
Lindsey:
So everyone, wasn’t that an amazing show about a wellness center? I would love to hear if anyone else has been implementing something similar, or if they are wanting to do more of these types of things on your campuses, because we can definitely collaborate and share resources with each other. These mental health challenges that we’re going to be facing this coming school year, we definitely want to be as collaborative as possible so that we can share information that’s working in one setting that might not work in another, but maybe it will. So let’s keep an open mind.
Lindsey:
And remember as always, you want to be kind first. So I want to keep hearing these stories about how you’re taking an initiative to make that first move, to show kindness first. Share your stories, comment them.
Lindsey:
And we are going to be taking two weeks off. We’ve got a holiday coming up, so you are not going to be able to see us. So if you missed any of our shows, take this time to watch our replays on our YouTube channel or on our Facebook group, and be sure to stay tuned, because in a couple of weeks we will be back and we will have more for us to share. Thanks, everyone.
