WHAT THE SCHOOLS CAN DO TO PROMOTE MENTAL HEALTH

The schools can help to ease mental health problems in several ways--preventing them from occurring and minimizing their severity and chronicity, and in assisting with the management of students who have problems. However, the most important role of the school lies in providing the best possible education. A given purpose must be examined to see where it falls within educative, socializing, classifying, or therapeutic roles. Some tasks, such as drug education, have been poorly, carried out because they are called "education," although actually they involve socialization. The school must be an integrated institution providing the best environment for the development of its pupils. This aim means providing the best education, but it also requires roles be clearly defined and followed out with a minimum of convert conflict.