[Source:  MindShift]

Teaching may be one of the most difficult jobs in the world, with expectations and demands coming from all sides. Teachers juggle content standards, the social and emotional needs of students, behavior, and often trauma, but they also are the first line of defense when students have mental health problems. Paying attention to all these elements helps create a well-run, high functioning classroom, but dealing with all of them well — often in overcrowded classrooms — can feel completely overwhelming.

To make it worse, most teachers are given very little training on how to detect mental health disorders in students. The National Institute of Mental Health estimates that one in five children has or will have a severe mental health disorder, so the lack of training is a huge disservice to teachers who are likely to encounter these issues in their students.

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