Mental Health Days: Let's Do Better for the Next Generation

By: Julianne Emberger

October 31, 2022

                                                    Teen experiencing burn out, wellmark.com

As you might have experienced, expectations on students of all ages continually increase. The demands rise and the assignments pile up each new year of schooling. With this increased pressure, it takes a toll on students' mental health especially when they are not getting the proper support from schools. 

Have you ever fallen victim to the pressures of schools and parents' expectations throughout kindergarten to senior year? What about the dismissal of your poor mental health by parents or guardians?!!

According to Supporting Student Mental Health in Higher Education, "Mental Health is defined as a state of well-being in which every individual realizes his or her own potential, can cope with the normal stresses of life, can work productively and fruitfully, and is able to make a contribution to her or his community." 

Achieving this well-being for students is especially challenging because schools and parents often brush off the poor mental health of kids and don't do anything to help children improve their mental state. 

One way schools can support students' mental health is by offering mental health days. Mental health days are days that students can take to rest and recharge their minds. They are used to provide the needed break from pressure and expectations and offer many benefits such as a brain recharge, the spark of open conversations about mental health, and the ability to learn and monitor their mental health needs and communicate them. 

These days would be used doing productive activities such as reading, going on a walk, drawing, and exercising. 

Don't you wish you could've taken a mental health day when you were younger?

Mental health days are not a new topic. Some states have already implemented these days, seen in the image below from verywellmind.org, so there is no reason why we cant expand these days to other states. 

States that allow student mental health days, verywellmind.com

One major reason to support mental health days includes the idea that with an already exerted and mentally exhausted brain, students aren't able to fully comprehend and internalize the new information they are learning because their brains are in overdrive. Students need to be given the time to mentally recharge their brains so that when presented with new information and learning, they are able to fully process the information. 

Student feeling mentally exhausted, familytutor.sg

Mental health days will ultimately provide a stronger learning experience for students. If the goal of schooling is to have a rich learning experience, then schools should be doing everything they can to promote this. 

Another benefit of mental health days is that they can start up conversations between students and parents about mental health. It can help break down the stigma around mental health disorders by having open conversations with parents and guardians. This will help students feel more accepted and heard both at home and in school because both places are actively accommodating to their mental state.

"According to the CDC, attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder, anxiety, depression, and behavior problems are the most commonly diagnosed mental disorders in kids." The majority of children's time are spent in schools, so schools need to be equipped to support students with these mental health disorders. 

Students spending time at school, cope2thrive.com

This will also help students learn to manage and monitor their mental health and have them become more comfortable communicating their mental state with trusted individuals. Students should be able to express how they truly feel but in order to do so, they need the adults in their lives to be open and accommodating to their mental health needs. 

It is important for kids of all ages to learn that it is okay to share how you are feeling and it is healthy to do so. When kids bottle their feelings up inside, it only adds to the burnout they may already be experiencing. 

In reaction to the ideas above, you may be saying to yourself, "Mental health days aren't enough to fix everything and support students fully." You would be absolutely correct; mental health days do not fix everything, but in a system that does next to nothing to support mental health right now, these days would be a step in the right direction.

These mental health days could even eventually spark more support from schools and parents. We should not give up on the idea of mental health days because it may seem like not enough. Not enough is better than nothing at all for these kids. 

You might also be thinking that kids might take advantage of these days (because what kid doesn't want a few days off?!). This is not as big of a concern as you may think because in order to take a mental health, the student has to communicate to their guardian their concerns. Then the guardian, not the child, gets to make the decision to call the school to get them an excused mental health day. Ultimately, the guardian is making the final decision since they are the ones who have to call the school. 

Mother providing support for her daughter, focusonthefamily.com

    

Family and schooling are the two main factors in students lives growing up, and it is important that these forces work together to properly display to children that their experiences are worthy of adults attention. 

                                        

With the implementation of mental health days for students, the school system and guardians would be showing us that our mental health is valid and important. Conversations of mental state should start young so that support can be given to students when they need it. If we aren't taught to take care of their mental state and communicate about it, our burn out may continue throughout the years. 

In the U.S, there needs to be more implementation of these days. Mental health days would allow students to take the mental break they need to rest, and it would show students how to properly cope with mental health obstacles in a healthy and productive way. In a system that doesn't acknowledge mental health as much as it should, mental health days are one way schools can be and should be more supportive and accommodating to students mental health needs.