Canopy Children’s Solutions announce new Mental Health Program with Madison County Schools

JACKSON, Miss. (WLBT) - A mental health crisis happening across the country is leading Canopy Children’s Solutions in Mississippi to partner with Madison County Schools to address some of the issues students and parents face every day.

”We have to meet our children where they are. And that is with that phone. It just is. So when we have providers that recognize that and want to take that to the next level, and when we have schools that see that and know, let’s capitalize on this, and let’s use this in a way to bring hope and to bring help and positivity to our children,” CEO of Canopy Children’s Solutions, John Damon, said.

With just a tap of a finger, your child in the Madison County School District will have access to help regarding their mental health within minutes.

“We have to meet our children where they are. And that is with that phone,” Executive Director of the Mississippi Department of Mental Health, Wendy Bailey, explained.

Canopy Children’s Solutions created an app called Canopy Anywhere, that would allow students to download and be prompted to take a mental health survey throughout the year -- so experts can give resources and help effectively.

“This technology will screen children under the most powerful emotion that we just talked about in the planet, which is hope. And what we will do it was then triage them into kind of primary, secondary and tertiary needs,” Damon said.

But the program isn’t just for your students, you will be able to opt-into the program as well.

“Sometimes you will see that when a child is reaching a critical level, there are some factors that may be going on at home, that a family is struggling with; whether it’s their finances, whether it is a language barrier, whether they’re having food shortages,” Director of Education Solutions with Canopy, Sean Brewer, said. “We have a team and a program that’s there for free to intervene and try to help those families where they are attached to services to help support them and bringing the overall health of the family unit up while we’re supporting the mental health of the child.”

Madison County Schools Superintendent Charlotte Seals said the program is something she knows her students need.

“Our students are under a lot of stress, anxiety, and then pressures from just society in general. They’re so much bigger now because of social media and things like that,” Seals said.

Seals added that she believe her students academic achievements will be impacted as well as a result.

“It’s becoming more and more relevant for students to have academic success, they’ve got to be healthy mentally and physically. And so we want to make sure that all of our students are equipped with the resources that they need,” Seals explained.

Brewer said the program could make parents, teachers and students feel safer while on school grounds.

“I think educators could and should feel a little safer about the environment and the climate of their of their school and their campus by having this asset as students accessing because we’re monitoring behind the scenes. These individuals that have perpetrated these terrible things in various locations across the country is evident, it’s easy to see, it’s well documented. So if we have a way to try to identify really low hope, early in the process, provide some help and resource and alert to this situation, maybe we can be a part of preventing some of those things,” Brewer explained.

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