Royal Oak Schools begins using Care Solace for mental health services

ROYAL OAK — Royal Oak Schools has implemented a mental health resource program called Care Solace to help provide students and their family members with access to mental health resources. 

The Care Solace program is free for students to use, but the district pays a $3 per student fee to the organization to keep it up and running. 

The district began using Care Solace around Thanksgiving, according to Superintendent John Tafelski, who said that he has a lot of experience with the program from previous schools. 

“It’s pretty prevalent in Wayne County, where I come from, and in Allen Park Public Schools, where I previously worked, and so I have used it a lot and I am familiar with it,” Tafelski said. “This is a gap that everyone has in education that is not unique to Royal Oak, Wayne County, or anywhere. And so having experience with it, and kind of having some goals around staff and student wellness, and now having Care Solace in Royal Oak, it was an easy decision to say that this is an area we should look at.”

Care Solace provides families within Royal Oak Schools a quick and easy way to find treatment options matched to their needs, according to Dina Bansen, the Royal Oak Schools lead psychologist. 

“It’s a 24/7 care coordination service. It helps to connect people to mental health and substance use treatment providers. It can also help people to find resources for shelter, food insecurity and low-cost medical or dental care,” she said. “One of the biggest challenges we see in the school is that families don’t know where to start when they need mental health support. It can be really difficult to find a provider to navigate insurance.”

Bansen said that the program removes the barriers of finding those resources, such as wait lists. Care Solace helps find a provider that can work with the individual’s needs, schedule, insurance and language.

Being a new superintendent, Tafelski said that this initiative helps to push his hopes and goals for the students of Royal Oak. 

“If a kid has a hard time learning, if they have a hard time getting their basic needs taken care of, we want to make sure that our families feel safe, warm, loved and mentally healthy. This helps to relieve some of the friction that is on families when it comes to looking for care for them and their households,” he said. “We have some families that are dealing with substance abuse and then other families that struggle with food insecurity and some of those other things that Solace can help with.”

The program does not replace in-school counseling, according to Bansen, who said it enhances the resources that those professionals can provide for the students. 

Care Solace also provides an easier way for staff to ensure that the students are following up on those resources. The program makes it simple for school counselors to immediately know if the student has seen a professional outside the school. 

“Being able to pass it off to Care Solace and knowing that there is going to be a follow-up and follow-through, that just makes us more efficient in school,” Tafelski said. “It makes things in school better. Dina and her staff and her people spend a lot of time asking if people get seen (by help). Now we don’t have to do that anymore, so that can be time they are spending on taking care of other students rather than the first half of (a student’s) visit being about a social worker or a psychologist on hold with a provider asking if they have seen the students.”

Care Solace can be used for all the family members associated with the Royal Oak students. 

“We are all human, and we understand that when we have a parent or sibling who is going through health problems, that impacts us on a daily basis,” Tafelski said. “Imagine being a 16-year-old student or a younger student and you realize a family member is having an issue and can’t seek care. So, this goes a long way with that too.”

Bansen said that Care Solace has already helped a handful of students and families since its inception.

“There is an impact report that certain designated staff members have access to that we can look at to see how it’s been used. We have had 23 warm handoffs, so that means a staff member has communicated with a parent that we want to make a referral and that they have made a referral,” Bansen said. “We have had three family-initiated cases, so that means families reached out on their own to Care Solace, and we have had 52 anonymous searches, so that’s when families can go in or staff can go in and see what services are offered through Care Solace. And we have had four confirmed appointments where a student or a family have gotten a recommendation from Care Solace of a provider and have made and attended an appointment.”

Bansen said the main priority of the Care Solace program is to remind families that they are not alone.

“If you or someone in your household needs help, or help navigating the mental health of substance use support, there are resources out there,” she said. “It’s available 24/7, 365 days a year. We know that early access care leads to better emotional well-being, improved school engagement and stronger academic outcomes.”

Care Solace is only available to the Royal Oak students and families. More information can be found at royaloakschools.org or caresolace.com/site/royaloakschools.