Combining MTSS and Community-Based Mentoring Programs

In the United States, schools provide a large portion of child and adolescent mental health services; however, systems are restricted by resource and workforce shortages while the need for services steadily increases. This discrepancy leads to unmanageable caseloads for providers and reduced access to quality services for youth, and highlights a need to expand the school-based workforce to meet student needs. Herein, we propose a novel mental health service-delivery framework to offset these challenges by integrating mentors within the context of multitiered systems of support (MTSS) through task-shifting. We review and synthesize the literature in community and school psychology on the promises and challenges of youth mentoring and MTSS. We discuss the importance of diversifying school psychology, including the importance of increasing access to and benefit from educational supports for minoritized students, and the promise of mentoring within this context. We propose that by systematically integrating youth mentoring within MTSS there are several systems-level and individual-level benefits for youth, school staff, and mentoring nonprofits. We conclude by providing ethical, evaluation, and implementation considerations surrounding the proposed model. Impact Statement: Restructuring the school-based mental health workforce by integrating community mentors into MTSS frameworks provides an innovative, powerful way to engage with diverse student populations. We propose a novel model that expands and strengthens this workforce, thereby increasing the quality and reach of school-based services.