Schools Provide Mobile Therapy For Students

Students in Cannon County schools, and their families, could be available for assistance from Centerstone through a partnership granted by the Cannon County Board of Education during its regular monthly meeting Tuesday (March 6) at the Cannon County Courthouse.

Centerstone is the nation's largest not-for-profit provider of community-based bahavioral healthcare, offering a full range of mental health services, substance abuse treatment and educational services.

Connie Foster, director of coordinated school health for Cannon County Schools, asked the Board for permission to enter into a partnership with Centerstone to provide mobile therapy services to children who qualify in Cannon County.

All Board members were present and unanimously granted permission to proceed with the mobile therapy service, a relatively new benefit offered by Centerstone.

"We are always coming across students that would benefit from therapy and families experience all kinds of barriers in getting their child to a therapy session," Foster said.

Cindy Cothran represented Centerstone at the meeting and informed the Board of the benefits and services offered through mobile therapy. Students would be referred to Centerstone by school counselors.

"Mobile therapy is a new program Centerstone has taken on in the last year," Cothran said. "We found that so many families have barriers and couldn't get to services. We started to getout into communities and provide those services."

Cothran said the services are paid for through the child's insurance.

"Generally the people we are serving through the mobile therapy program have TennCare Services, which means the state-funded insurance, so that is going to tend to be lower economic status families," Cothran said. "These may be families who are most at risk or children who typically have the most behavior and emotional problems at school."

Cothran said Centerstone has a therapist in place that would serve Cannon County.

• Special Education Director Pam Sonderman addressed the Board regarding an award from the State referencing the Cannon County School System's School-Wide Positive Behavior Support program.

• Board member Shannon Davenport updated the Board regarding TSBA Day on the Hill. Davenport said teacher's evaluations is the current hot topic.

• Director of Schools Barbara Parker recognized members of the Cannon County Family Consumer Science program and presented certificates to students who recently competed in district competition and advanced to state.