Early Childhood Mental Health Consultation

The Illinois Children's Mental Health Partnership identified mental health consultation as a key strategy for supporting and building the capacity of a variety of providers to respond to the social/emotional and mental health needs of young children. Consultation pilot projects have been launched in a select group of community mental health agencies across the state and in a select number of sites within the Healthy Families Illinois program. The Early Childhood Mental Health Consultants identified a need for additional support and training to increase their ability to work with early childhood providers. Reflective Learning Groups were created to meet the need of the Consultants.

Early Childhood Mental Health Consultation Project

The purpose of this project is to develop and pilot test a Children's Mental Health Consultation model to help build the capacity of mental health providers to respond to the mental health needs of young children ages 0-7.  Mental health consultants serve as important resources to assist professionals in understanding the social and emotional development of children; identifying and addressing children's mental health needs; working on specific issues and cases; and identifying appropriate referral resources. They also can assist providers to better partner with parents to promote the social/emotional development and mental health of their children. There are seven  sites that have completed the project, and five sites are currently participating in the project, which entails an 18 month project period and a technical assistance year. They are as follows:

• Cohort I (May 2007 – April 2009)
  McHenry County Youth Service Board, Community Counseling Centers of Chicago(C-4), Beacon Therapeutic (Chicago), Coles County Mental Health Center (Matoon), The Helen Wheeler Center for Community Mental Health (Kankakee), Janet Wattles Mental Health Center (Rockford), and Mental Health Center of Champaign County (Champaign.)

• Cohort II (July 2008 – June 2010)
  Pillars (Chicago), Family Service and Community Mental Health Center (McHenry), Community Resource Center (Centralia), Chestnut Health Systems (Granite City), and Franklin-Williamson Human Services (West Frankfort/Marion).

Healthy Families Consultation Project

The project is designed to build and enhance program staff capacity to recognize and address the mental health needs of young children ages 0-5 and their families. Sites are funded to contract with an early childhood consultant who will provide reflective supervision, training, clinical client group services and accompany staff on home visits as appropriate. There are four sites that have been selected to participate in the project for one year with the expectation that there will be continued funding for an additional year and they are as follows:

• Cohort I (July 2008 – December 2010)
  Teen Parent Connection (Glen Ellyn), Visiting Nurse Association of Fox Valley (Aurora), Sangamon County (Springfield), and Stephenson County (Freeport.)

• Cohort II (January 2010 – present)                                                                                             Aunt Martha’s (Chicago – Ford Heights), La Voz Latina (Rockford), Children’s Home Association of Illinois (Peoria), Macon County Health Department (Decatur), and Child Abuse Council (Rock Island)

Early Childhood Mental Health Consultation Reflective Learning Groups

The Illinois Children’s Mental Health Partnership, in collaboration with Caregiver Connections, and Erikson Institute, developed Reflective Learning Groups for infant and early childhood mental health consultants (IECMHC’s) in Illinois. The overarching goal of the RLG Project is to increase reflective learning opportunities in order to create, support and sustain a qualified workforce of effective IECMH Consultants in Illinois. RLGs will:

• Enhance knowledge, theory and practice of IECMH
• Increase collaboration across statewide consultation initiatives
• Inform training needs of consultants

In Illinois, mental health consultants support the work of infant and early childhood caregivers, providers, teachers, home visitors, and early intervention staff – in child care centers, home child care, family homes, and early intervention offices. An infant and early childhood mental health consultant is often the voice for a child or group of children – helping to build the capacity of care providers to understand and meet the needs of infants, children and their families.

IECMH Consultants from the six statewide ECMH Consultation Initiatives participate in the RLGs:

• Caregiver Connections
• Early Intervention Social Emotional Consultants
• Enhancing Developmentally Oriented Primary Care
• Erikson Early Childhood Mental Health Consultation Project
• ICMHP Children’s Mental Health Consultation Project
• ICMHP Healthy Families Illinois Mental Health Consultation Project

The 10 RLG locations are: Belleville, Champaign, Chicago, Chicago, Galesburg, Lisle, North Cook, Rockford, Springfield, and South Cook.

For more information, contact Ashleigh Kirk at akirk@voices4kids.org