What is Response Ability?
Response Ability Teacher Education is a complementary initiative to the MindMatters and KidsMatter initiatives.
The Response Ability Education initiative seeks to facilitate the integration of mental health promotion, prevention and early intervention and suicide prevention issues into secondary, primary and early childhood pre-service teacher education including the Vocational Education and Training (VET) sector.
The Response Ability resources support the important role that teachers, schools and early childhood services play in promoting the social and emotional wellbeing (or mental health) of children and young people through creating supportive classrooms and school environments, as well as referring troubled young people to counsellors or other professionals.
Response Ability is an initiative of the Commonwealth Department of Health and Ageing and is being implemented by the Hunter Institute of Mental Health in collaboration with Australian universities and tertiary educators.
Why is this important?
Studies have shown that a mental health problem may adversely affect a school student's behaviour, academic performance and school relationships. However, many schools and teachers feel uncertain about how best to respond to mental health issues.
Who benefits?
Primary and Secondary school students and secondary student/qualified teachers/tutors dealing with mental health problems benefit from Response Ability.
As part of the Council of Australian Governments' (COAG) Mental Health New Early Intervention Services for Parents, Children and Young People measure, this initiative is now also developing similar resources to assist the integration of mental health promotion, prevention and early intervention and suicide prevention issues into undergraduate training for early childhood workers as well as VET sector competencies for early childhood staff trained through that sector.
What is Response Ability delivering?
The Response Ability multi-media teaching resources, for trainee primary and secondary school teachers, continues to be provided to Australian universities and colleges delivering programs in primary and secondary school education, with copies made available to training officers within secondary schools to support teacher professional development.
Key questions addressed by the Response Ability resource are:
- What is mental health?
- How does it differ from mental illness?
- How do mental health problems affect young people's behaviour, relationships with others and academic performance?
- What can schools and teachers do to help young people develop positive mental health?
- How should teachers and schools respond to troubled young people, such as those with depression or other mental health problems?
Information and resources are also available for educators and students of journalism and communications about professional and ethical issues involved in reporting on suicide and mental illness.
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How does it work?
The Response Ability package of resources is designed to fit in with current teacher training courses, and gives universities and student teachers an opportunity to explore adolescent mental health issues in depth, including such topics as promoting positive mental health, identifying and responding to troubled young people, working with parents and the broader community, utilising the school curriculum, and creating a supportive school environment.
The Response Ability resources include a website to support the use of the multi-media packages in Australian universities and tertiary colleges. The website address is: www.responseability.org.
What funding is attached to this initiative?
The Australian Government is providing $1,292,707 to 30 June 2009 for Response Ability Education.
When did Response Ability start?
Response Ability began in the late 1990s, and developed resources to support the training of high school teachers, nurses and journalists.
In 2005, supplementary resource materials for educators in communications and public relation courses were also developed.
In 2007 primary school resources were developed and in 2008 the development of TAFE/VET sector resources commenced.
How is Response Ability progressing?
Response Ability resources are being used at over 90% of university campuses offering programs in secondary education or middle schooling and 80% of university campuses offering degrees in journalism.
Increasingly, the principles of Response Ability are integrated into compulsory education subjects, rather than being primarily explored in health teaching or elective units.
Evaluations have shown that:
- universities embraced the provision of training in social and emotional wellbeing as it relates to the learning setting;
- the Response Ability Education resources are efficacious, relevant, accessible and valuable; and
- cultural change around views on reporting suicide and mental illness has been evidenced by informal indicators.
The Response Ability website is well used. From December 2006 to May 2007 the Response Ability website received over 236,000 hits and over 31,000 visitors.
A longitudinal evaluation is planned for commencement in mid to late 2008 and will provide information that includes the way trainee and new teachers use learnings from Response Ability in the school and classroom.
Further information
Visit the Response Ability website.
Page currency, Latest update: 10 May, 2007