PART I - SCPR SERIES - ISSUE 1: "REALLY" ABOUT DEALING WITH MENTAL HEALTH ISSUES OF STARK CO PUBLIC SCHOOL STUDENTS?

UPDATED:  2:28 PM

MUST SEE

BY PLAIN LSD (MAY & HALKIAS) ISSUE #1 PRESENTATION

FOR PARENTS, STUDENTS & SCHOOL OFFICIALS

The baseline question that Stark Countians living in participating districts (see above)  have to deal with in considering whether or not to vote for Issue 1 is, mainly, from The Stark County Political Report's (SCPR, The Report) perspective is the mental health of a portion of Stark County public school students who offer the potential to turn violent and turn a Stark County school into a Columbine, Chardon, Sandy Hook or Stoneman carnage.

For a full background on how Issue #1 came to be on the ballot, LINK to this April 24, 2018 SCPR blog.

And here is a "sample" ballot for the issue:



Plain Township school officials John Halkias (president of the Plain Local School District and president-elect of the Ohio State School Board Association) and Brent May (beginning his ninth year as superintendent of Plain Local Schools) said nothing to dispel the SCPR's take on the "real" problem with public school security.

Clearly, the key issue is a mental health issue that has the promise of "preventing" in-school violence/suicide problems.

Having more armed guards or armed school employees is "stop-gap" at best.

Here is a copy of the "kick-off" campaign literature piece mailed out within the past few days by the pro-issue-#1 campaign group.



May, on Thursday, July 12th and Halkias appeared before about two dozen or so "interested-in-school violence issues" citizens at the Stark County Democratic Party Headquarters located in Oakwood Square in Plain Township.

In the appendix to this blog, the entire session (1 hour, 22 minutes) can be seen.

May opened the meeting in reciting that since August, 2017 (folks:  a period of less than a year) 15 Stark County public school students have committed suicide.

A National Institute of Mental Health report (2014) alarmingly says that suicide is the second leading cause of death among teens but does temper the alarm in adding that teen suicide "still is a rare event."  The highest group is the age 45 to 50 group which stands about about 25 per 100,000 of population compared to about 5 per 100,000 of population.

A recent USA Today article citing a Center of Disease Control chart speaks to a "soaring" rate of teen suicide as shown in the chart below and to the the left of this text.

Of particular concern to public school officials has to be that the leading means of suicide is reported to be by firearms in the context of the school environment and a "suicidal" mission in which a suicidal person's perception is that he/she needs to bring his/her fellow students into a scenario in which he/she dies either at his/her own hand or at the hand of law enforcement officials.

May compares the 15 over the past year to "since 1980 Stark County has been having 1 to 2 suicides a year."  (presumptively, he was talking about teen suicides but did not directly say so)

He then asks the question:  "Why 15, why so many, why the spike?"

May went on:  "Last year 199 kids ages 15 to 17 went to Aultman Hospital went for  mental health issues including suicide ideation and suicide attempts  ... 72 of them were kids from Plain Local ... to Akron Childrens' Hospital ... for mental health issues 1,344 kids from Stark County and 493 of those kids were from Plain Local."

May cites numbers from a Center for Disease Control study (having been asked to come to Stark County because of the spike in teen suicide deaths by the Stark County/Ohio Health Departments) showing: (of the students [grades 7 through 12] willing to participate in the survey [85% did] in participating school districts [implication being that not all districts participated]):

• 9% say they had attempted suicide at least one time,
• Note:  there about about 6100 public school students in Stark county which (if the 9% are representative) means that approximately 600 Stark County public school students have attempted suicide
• 10.5% engaged suicide ideation "with a plan,"
• the highest percentage of the 10.5% were females in the 12th grade

May went on with the following statistics and anecdotal information:

• Ohio #2 in the nation in school threats
• cited Stark County as having many threats ("almost daily in Plain")
• a lot of "copycats" prompted by social media postings
• which were wildly exaggerated by the time they got to Plain's administrationP
• Plain's SOP (Standard Operating Procedure)
• contact sheriff's office,
• who would get out into homes so that
• schools could be ensured that school would be safe the next day
• On the data from the CDE survey of participating school district 7 - 12 students:
• of the 85% of students taking the survey; they had to complete the entire survey,
• Plain schools has a plan to share the insights gained from the survey with the Plain administrative/teaching staff,

May described the make up of the county task force promoting the 1.49 mills Security and Mental Health Resources levy up for a special election for participating school districts on August 7, 2018:

• FBI,
• Stark County sheriff George T. Maier,
• Homeland Security,
• many local law enforcement officials, and, of course,
• participating school district educators

Considerations, according to May:

• What should we be talking to our community about?
• What should we be looking at?

Task Force recommendations (again, according to May):

• having additional law enforcement in public school buildings,
• dealing with mental health issues,
• using metal detection wands,
• a system that would give video access to first responders (fire, police & ems),
• a way of access for people to get into a school building for purpose of identifying those who pose a risk to the safety of students,
• instituting a curriculum/reporting system called "Sandy Hook Promise,"

• training for bus drivers and bus aides,
• training for students ("digital citizenship")
• how does a student use social media the "correct" way,

Halkias:  Two things not recommended by Task Force:

• Use of metal detectors because of logistical problems of numbers of students and number of entrances to many school buildings,
• arming school employees,
• an individual school district decision
• some districts in Stark arming school employee

What is the Plain plan for security and mental health resources?

According to May:

• adding law enforcement personnel to Plain buildings
• two at the high school,
• two at the middle school,
• two at intermediate school, and
• one each on east/west side of district for elementary schools
• implementing a 10 year agreement with Child and Adolescent Behavioral Health to be on-site (the high school) as a fulltime service to the Plain School District community that will be accessible through a seperate entrance,
• placement of MARCS' (Multi-Agency Radio Communications System) in every building which:
• communicates emergency communications between schools to first responders which engages any law enforcement personnel in the area of the building to respond to a call no matter what policing unit the law enforcement person works for,J
• placement of blue strobe lights in buildings as a warning that there is a problem within a given building
• e.g. bus pulls into discharge of students area of building sees "blue strobe" light and immediately pull right out,
• light initiates an announcement:  "Do Not Enter" building, classroom, hallway, gym, et cetera,
• continue emergency drills mandated by the state of Ohio (Plain does 19 drills a year),
• encourage students to communicate with law enforcement/school officials "see something, tell us."
• annual meeting with first responders,
• "active shooter" training for staff,
• implement "codes" for entrance re: first responders,
• communicate with community (e.g. parents of students) of how to interact with schools when an in building emergency situation develops,

What is the county plan for security and mental health resources?

May had this to say about the county scheme of things on security:

• Joe Chaddock, superintendent of the Stark County Educational Service Center (SCESC), worked with state officials to make the 1.49 mill levy proposal possible,
• Note:  this blogger's wife is a member of the SCESC and attended the May/Halkias presentation of July 12th)
• SCESC:
• put together the county task force,
• brought in Sandy Hook Promise to Stark County,
• bring together educators, law enforcement, mental health providers and put them all in the same room in considering measures to deal with security/mental health issues in Stark County's public schools,

Now that readers have an outline of the May/Halkias presentation, here is the "actual" video of the presentations (about 26 minutes long) to hear in their own words why Superintendent May and Plain Local School president John Halkias fervently believe that citizens is the following listed school districts (Stark County portion only) ought to vote for Issue 1 on August (or before [i.e. early/absentee voting] 7th.

Note:  Not everything May/Halkias had to say is in the outline set forth above.

In additional parts of the SCPR series, The Report will present Questions and Answers between the May/Halkias and those attending their July 12 presentation.

There were a number of audience members who pressed May and Halkias quite effectively in posing questions the answers to which or lack thereof that voters will want to consider before deciding how to vote on the issue.

Readers can depend on the SCPR to fully and comprehensively cover "all" the material relevant to their deciding how to vote on the issue.

On or about July 26th, the SCPR will be publishing the pre-election campaign finance report so readers will know who is financially support the effort to pass Issue #1.

The Stark County Political Report's objective is to have anyone planning to vote in this special election to be fully informed before casting a ballot.

APPENDIX

Entire video of May/Halkias Plain LSD "security/mental health resources" 1.49 mill levy presentation of July 12, 2018 at the Stark County Democratic Party Headquarters (1 hour, 17 min).